IP Audit SOP
XERO
PASN:("Xero")
Client links
Competitors (4)
- Sage
PASN:("The Sage Group plc") - FreshBooks
PASN:("FreshBooks Inc") - Intuit QuickBooks Online
PASN:("Intuit Inc") - Zoho Books
PASN:(\"Zoho Corporation\")
Done
audit 8e6a0d11
created 23 Jul 2026, 12:43
XERO / IP AUDIT SOP / LIVE DATA MAP
Working sheet
Portfolio records 592Families 195Alive 395USPTO covered 137
76 of 76 modules
Scores apply the workbook logic with reviewer remarks as overrides. An asterisk marks a transparent proxy or pending reviewer adjustment; missing evidence is never scored as zero, and “—” means the workbook defines no rubric. Click a row to see the basis.
| Section | Module | Key number | Score | Headline | What it shows | State | Scope | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| What's Working7 live · 8 modules | ||||||||
| What's Working | Portfolio scale | 592 records · 195 families | 3/10 | 195 portfolio families are loaded; the same-scope alive-publication proxy ranks XERO #2 of 2. | Total patent families worldwide, incl. subsidiary & acquired-entity filings | LIVE | Portfolio DB | |
| What's Working | In-force core | 189 active-granted · 207 active-applied | 7.3/10 | 77 families retain an active grant; 27 are pending-only and 29 have no active grant. | PatSeer Quick Stats active-granted and active-applied steering publications | LIVE | PatSeer Quick Stats | |
| What's Working | Grant rate | 43.5% · 227 grants / 522 applications | 8/10 | 227/269 decided applications produced a grant (84.4%); 189 pending applications are excluded. | Worldwide historical grants divided by all grant-capable applications ever filed | LIVE | Portfolio DB | |
| What's Working | Grant speed (rubric) | 26.5 mo median | 7/10 | 26.6 months average filing-to-grant across 82 USPTO grants; the median is 26.5 months. | Average filing-to-grant in months, scored: <12mo=10, 12-15=9, 15-24=8, 24-30=7, 30-35=6, 35-40=5, >40=4. Photon benchmark 11mo = 10 | LIVE | USPTO covered | |
| What's Working | Technology franchises | 3.4% mechanical | 7/10 | 80 active families sit in the largest technology domain (ELECTRICAL ENGINEERING; 76.9% of active families). | Depth per product line / CPC cluster - real moats vs scattered filings | LIVE | Portfolio DB | |
| What's Working | Inventor-geography alignment | 64 US inventor mentions | Not a score | 258 inventor identities are visible; inventor location is an R&D and first-filing map, not a filing-quality score. | Where inventors sit vs where patents are filed - whether filings follow the R&D map | LIVE | Portfolio DB | |
| What's Working | Geographic alignment | 21 filing jurisdictions | Needs input | 21 filing jurisdictions are loaded; revenue-weighted and manufacturing-weighted coverage is still unknown. | Filed where revenue/factories actually are | NEEDS INPUT | Portfolio DB + approved input | |
| What's Working | Rank vs rivals | #2 of 2 · 592 publications | 3/10 | XERO ranks #2 of 2 by same-scope alive publications (396); claim-quality review remains separate. | More patents than any direct competitor | LIVE | PatSeer Quick Stats | |
| What's Not Working17 live · 25 modules | ||||||||
| What's Not WorkingFOCUS | Chain of title | 39 families flagged · 0 security-release gaps | 4.9/10 | 39 of 77 families are document-review candidates; none is treated as a confirmed title defect yet. | USPTO assignment, inventor-conveyance, and security-interest records flagged for document review | LIVE | Portfolio DB + USPTO covered | |
| What's Not Working | Cost of Delayed filings/missing Deadline | 55 granted extensions · 1,644 applicant-delay days | 6/10 | 33 of 137 applications had at least one granted extension (24.1%); 12 applications show a repeat-event pattern. | USPTO extension frequency and applicant-delay/PTA evidence; no dollar amount yet | LIVE | USPTO covered | |
| What's Not Working | IP Drain | Needs input | Needs input | No departure is inferred from 258 inventor identities; current-employer and same-technology filing evidence is absent. | Inventors who have joined a competitor or started a competing business or a company serving the same product to the same market | NEEDS INPUT | Portfolio DB + approved input | |
| What's Not Working | High OA Cost | 241 OA events · max 13 | 7/10 | 241 OAs across 108 prosecuted applications feed the combined 1.6-OA-per-grant efficiency result. | It shows the quality of prosecution being done by a lawyer | LIVE | USPTO covered | |
| What's Not Working | Dead by default | 25 nonpayment records | 7.3/10 | 25 nonpayment records require client review to separate deliberate pruning from patents that lapsed without a decision. | Patents lost to unpaid fees - lapses nobody decided | LIVE | Portfolio DB | |
| What's Not Working | Dead-application waste | 10 abandoned apps | 8/10 | 10/92 disposed USPTO applications were abandoned (10.9%); no flat $25–30K multiplier is used. | Applications that died pre-grant x $25-30K each = money spent with nothing to show | LIVE | USPTO covered | |
| What's Not Working | Fines & extension fees | 55 granted extensions · 1,644 applicant-delay days | 7.6/10 | 55 extension events affect 33 applications; exact month tiers, entity tiers and paid amounts are unavailable. | USPTO extension frequency and applicant-delay/PTA evidence; no dollar amount yet | LIVE | USPTO covered | |
| What's Not Working | Prosecution cost per patent | 241 OAs · 62 RCEs | 7/10 | 1.6 OAs per granted application; 30.5% of grants required an RCE. | Office actions per patent, RCE count; every OA round = another invoice at hourly firms | LIVE | USPTO covered | |
| What's Not Working | Appeals red flag | 6 apps · 9 appeal briefs | 8/10 | 6 appealed applications currently resolve to 3 grants, 1 abandonments and 2 pending/other outcomes. | Cases that went to appeal (~3x cost of normal prosecution) | LIVE | USPTO covered | |
| What's Not Working | Examiner interviews | 46 apps · 147 events | 8/10 | 46/108 substantively prosecuted applications have an interview event (42.6%). | How many interviews current counsel conducted (low = passive prosecution) | LIVE | USPTO covered | |
| What's Not Working | Grant delay vs benchmark | 26.5 mo client median | 7/10 | 26.6 months average to grant is already scored once under Grant speed; no comparable peer cohort is loaded. | Client average vs Photon 11-month benchmark vs competitors' grant timelines | NEEDS INPUT | USPTO covered + approved input | |
| What's Not Working | Pipeline decay | 63 2024 filings · 34 near-term expiries | 10/10 | 31 families filed in 2024 versus 5.4 family expiries per year over the next five years (5.7×; -44.6% versus 2022). | Filings per year trend + expiry cliff - moat draining faster than refilling | LIVE | Portfolio DB | |
| What's Not Working | White space | Input required | Needs roadmap | No revenue-product-line coverage share is available, and the fastest-growing roadmap line has not been confirmed. | Product/revenue areas with zero or thin filings (mapped vs where the business is going) | NEEDS INPUT | Portfolio DB + approved input | |
| What's Not Working | Patent-to-product gaps | Input required | Needs input | A client-confirmed feature list and claims mapping—including pending applications—are required before calling any shipped feature exposed. | Shipped features with no patent behind them - invention exposed to competitors | NEEDS INPUT | Portfolio DB + approved input | |
| What's Not Working | Geographic coverage gaps | Input required | Needs input | 21 client jurisdictions are known; rival markets have not been filtered through client sales and manufacturing relevance. | Where competitors file vs where client files; rate the footprint | NEEDS INPUT | Portfolio DB + approved input | |
| What's Not Working | Claim vulnerability | 0 §101 apps · 0 §112 apps | 10/10 | 0/137 USPTO applications have a §101 or §112 rejection history (0.0%); assessment dated 2026-07-19. | Abstract software/AI claims exposed to S.101 challenge | LIVE | USPTO covered | |
| What's Not Working | M&A readiness score | Input required | Rubric incomplete | The mock-diligence score is withheld until the seven checks, point weights and feeder modules are written and approved. | Mock buy-side diligence: 7 checks scored /100, path to ~90 | NEEDS INPUT | Portfolio DB + approved input | |
| What's Not WorkingFOCUS | Term surrendered (PTA ledger) | 3,253 applicant-delay days · 1,076 observed PTA offset | 7/10 | 3,253 applicant-delay days equal 8.9 aggregate years across 70 PTA ledgers (46.5 days/ledger; worst 278). | USPTO applicant-delay ledger and observed reduction in otherwise available patent-term adjustment | LIVE | USPTO covered | |
| What's Not Working | Speed paradox (Track One vs PTA) | 0 verified purchases · 8 T1OFF candidates · 1 abandoned | Not applicable | 0 confirmed Track One purchases were found; 8 T1OFF-only records are excluded from purchase and cost claims. | Track One-status candidates, payment verification, applicant-delay evidence, and prosecution outcome | NEEDS INPUT | USPTO covered + fee-payment records | |
| What's Not WorkingFOCUS | Art-unit routing split | 53 apps in 36xx | Not applicable | The portfolio is automotive/mechanical; its 36xx applications are not a valid business-method cohort for the workbook's software/fintech routing rubric. | Outcomes by art unit family (36xx business-method vs technical units): abandonments, appeal losses, avg OAs per case in each lane. | LIVE | USPTO covered | |
| What's Not Working | Claim-scope erosion | Input required | Attorney review | Filed-versus-allowed Claim 1 pairs and continuation-open results have not yet been computed for approved flagship families. | Claim 1 word count as-filed vs as-granted on flagships (+X%), plus % of grants scope-frozen (no continuation open). | NEEDS INPUT | Portfolio DB + approved input | |
| What's Not Working | Interview gap on troubled cases | 27 of 49 without interview | 4.5/10 | 27/49 troubled applications had no interview; the troubled-case interview rate is 44.9%. | Of cases currently in trouble, how many never had an examiner interview (vs healthy overall rate). | LIVE | USPTO covered | |
| What's Not Working | Citation paradox (war case) | 208 max family citations | 8/10 | The most-cited currently active-granted family has 208 family citations; scope health remains unreviewed. | The most-forward-cited family vs its prosecution state (e.g. 144 citations, 13 OAs, lost appeal, still unprotected). | LIVE | Portfolio DB + USPTO covered | |
| What's Not Working | High RCE COST | 62 RCEs · 39 apps | 7/10 | 62 RCEs are recorded and 30.5% of granted applications required an RCE; this carries the shared Prosecution efficiency score. | It shows the efficiency of the prosecution | LIVE | USPTO covered | |
| What's Not Working | Filing-route design | 68 foreign-priority apps | 5/10 | 68/137 USPTO applications contain foreign-priority data (49.6%), used as the front-loading proxy. | Route map: home-provisional + PCT front-load months before US examination starts, vs direct-US-first. Pair with Track One spend. | LIVE | USPTO covered | |
| CLUB HEADLINES0 live · 3 modules | ||||||||
| CLUB HEADLINESFOCUS | Cost of the status quo | 10 dead · 62 RCE · 55 extensions | — | 10 dead · 62 RCE · 55 extensions. Certified volumes are live; a dollar headline waits for a deduplicated, event-dated cost ledger. | One stacked money number: what the current operating model has burned + leaks per year. GC's sentence: "We're leaking ~$X/yr and I can show you where." | DERIVED | Approved assumptions + Portfolio DB | |
| CLUB HEADLINESFOCUS | Do you own what you think you own? | 104 assignment histories | — | 104 assignment histories. Ownership integrity cannot be stated until candidate records are document-reviewed against the intended owner. | One integrity count: records whose ownership or status doesn't match reality. GC's sentence: "N of our assets we can't currently prove." | DERIVED | Approved assumptions + Portfolio DB | |
| CLUB HEADLINES | The moat is draining | 34 expiring in five years | — | 63 filings entered in 2024 while 34 records approach expiry within five years; product importance is not yet weighted. | One direction-of-travel visual: expiries out vs filings in, rivals' trend lines rising on the same chart. GC's sentence: "We shrink every year while competitors accelerate." | DERIVED | Approved assumptions + Portfolio DB | |
| Your Savings0 live · 11 modules | ||||||||
| Your Savings | Country pruning | 21 jurisdictions to review | — | 21 jurisdictions are visible; no country is called non-core until the client confirms its revenue and manufacturing map. | Drop non-core jurisdictions; lifetime renewal $ freed (interactive include/exclude table) | DERIVED | Approved assumptions + Portfolio DB | |
| Your Savings | Family pruning (pruning logic) | Awaiting approved assumptions | — | No family is a savings candidate until the pruning model and business-importance review are completed. | Keep/kill score per family via Prayank's pruning model; $ saved | DERIVED | Approved assumptions + Portfolio DB | |
| Your Savings | Flat fee vs hourly calculator | Awaiting approved assumptions | — | Savings are withheld: incumbent invoices and the client-specific Photon rate card are not present in the workbook. | Per-filing: Photon flat vs incumbent firm rate x filings/year (interactive sliders) | DERIVED | Approved assumptions + Portfolio DB | |
| Your Savings | Prosecution savings | 241 OA · 62 RCE events | — | 241 observed OA rounds define the workload; any savings figure must use non-duplicative invoices or clearly labelled benchmark rates. | OA count x per-response billing at incumbent vs unlimited-included at Photon | DERIVED | Approved assumptions + Portfolio DB | |
| Your Savings | Fines eliminated | 55 extension events | — | 55 extension events are candidates for review; exact avoidable fees require extension month, entity tier and transaction-date pricing. | Extension/penalty spend that goes to zero with deadline discipline | DERIVED | Approved assumptions + Portfolio DB | |
| Your Savings | Dead-app risk transfer | 10 abandoned apps | — | 10 abandoned applications are visible; contractual eligibility and case-level cost evidence are required before valuing risk transfer. | Money-back-if-rejected removes the $25-30K-per-dead-application risk | DERIVED | Approved assumptions + Portfolio DB | |
| Your Savings | Annuity management | Awaiting approved assumptions | — | Renewal-administration savings are withheld until patent-country units, incumbent charges and a verified current quote are loaded. | $230/patent/country vs current D&M/CPA renewal service rates | DERIVED | Approved assumptions + Portfolio DB | |
| Your Savings | Consolidation | Awaiting approved assumptions | — | A consolidation headline requires the current firm map, foreign-associate structure and documented coordination or markup costs. | One firm + included foreign counsel vs US firm + marked-up foreign associates | DERIVED | Approved assumptions + Portfolio DB | |
| Your Savings | Budget certainty | Awaiting approved assumptions | — | Budget certainty is a service proposition, not a measured saving until historical invoices and the proposed fixed budget are compared. | Hourly billing = unpredictable yearly budget; flat = certainty and clarity | DERIVED | Approved assumptions + Portfolio DB | |
| Your SavingsFOCUS | Sunk-cost ledger (defensible) | 10 dead · 241 OA · 62 RCE | — | 10 dead matters, 241 OA rounds and 62 RCEs are available for a case-level estimated floor—not a flat per-case multiplier. | One floor number: (dead-app drafting + filing fees + OA responses + RCE fees + lost appeals) at certified counts x citable rates. Five stated conservatisms. | DERIVED | Approved assumptions + Portfolio DB | |
| Your Savings | Paid-to-be-late (extensions) | 55 events · 3,253 delay days | — | 55 extension events and 3,253 applicant-delay days are separate evidence lines; cash and patent term are not double-counted. | Extension-of-time count x fee tier = cash floor, PLUS the same days counted as PTA loss (double loss: fee + term). | DERIVED | Approved assumptions + Portfolio DB | |
| Competitor Watch5 live · 11 modules | ||||||||
| Competitor Watch | Portfolio size ranking | #2 of 2 · 592 publications | — | The supplied publication proxy ranks XERO #2 of 2; active-family counts are required for the workbook-approved rank. | Patent counts per rival, granted/pending/inactive split (stacked bars) | LIVE | PatSeer Quick Stats | |
| Competitor Watch | Filing trends | 63 XERO publications in application year 2024 | — | 63 XERO publications have application year 2024; incomplete 2025–2026 cohorts are excluded from the trend. | Applications per year per rival over 10 years - who is accelerating | LIVE | PatSeer Quick Stats | |
| Competitor Watch | Grant rate comparison | 86.96% XERO | — | 84.4% of portfolio-wide decided applications produced a grant; peer comparisons must use the same denominator. | % granted per rival - quality vs volume story | LIVE | PatSeer Quick Stats | |
| Competitor Watch | Grant speed comparison | Input required | — | 26.6 months average to grant; peer speed is not loaded and this comparison must feed the single Grant speed score. | How fast rivals get patents vs client | NEEDS INPUT | Competitor Quick Stats + external input | |
| Competitor Watch | Country spread | Rivals in 15 countries vs XERO in 21 | — | Rivals file in 15 distinct jurisdictions vs 21 for XERO; 3 are markets a rival enters but XERO does not. | Rivals filing in N countries vs client in M - geographic ambition gap | LIVE | Competitor Quick Stats + external input | |
| Competitor Watch | Technology overlap map | Input required | — | No claims-level overlap or whitespace conclusion is available; classification overlap alone is not an FTO opinion. | Category by category: rival patent numbers vs client position (no coverage / FTO check / covered) | NEEDS INPUT | Competitor Quick Stats + external input | |
| Competitor Watch | Expired rival IP | Input required | — | No rival family is labelled free-to-use until expiry and the absence of a live continuation are both confirmed. | Rival patents now public domain = free technology to build on | NEEDS INPUT | Competitor Quick Stats + external input | |
| Competitor Watch | Threat watch | 5 competitor momentum series | — | Aggregate competitor momentum is available, but no technology-specific filing surge has been verified. | Which rival surged filings in client's core recently | NEEDS INPUT | Competitor Quick Stats + external input | |
| Competitor WatchFOCUS | Employee IP leakage | Awaiting review | — | No former-inventor movement or same-technology competitor filing has been verified; no leakage accusation is made. | 5-6 ex-client inventors now filing at competitors or own startups: name, current company, patent status | NEEDS INPUT | Portfolio DB + approved input | |
| Competitor Watch | Category M&A moves | Input required | — | Category transactions and transferred patent families have not been loaded. | Who bought what in the category and what patents traded | NEEDS INPUT | Competitor Quick Stats + external input | |
| Competitor WatchFOCUS | Counsel scoreboard | 15+ current-counsel groups | — | 15+ current-counsel groups. Current correspondence counsel is a collection-time attribution, not proof of responsibility for every historical outcome. | Per law firm: applications handled, granted, abandoned, currently in trouble - by USPTO customer number (sees losses, not just wins). | LIVE | USPTO covered | |
| Trademarks0 live · 11 modules | ||||||||
| Trademarks | Register health | No source loaded | — | Trademark register data has not been loaded; registered, pending and ended counts are unavailable. | Registered / pending / ended counts + full register table | UNAVAILABLE | External input | |
| Trademarks | Dead but marketed | No source loaded | — | No ended trademark has been matched to current commercial use because register and marketing datasets are absent. | Marks expired on register yet still used on website/marketing | UNAVAILABLE | External input | |
| Trademarks | In-use but unfiled | No source loaded | — | No product name is labelled unfiled until the client-confirmed name list is checked across relevant registers. | Product/program names actively sold with zero filings anywhere | UNAVAILABLE | External input | |
| Trademarks | Flagship/acquired brands unfiled | No source loaded | — | Acquired-brand and trademark-register datasets are required before identifying an ownership gap. | Acquired brand names never registered by acquirer | UNAVAILABLE | External input | |
| Trademarks | Missing classes | No source loaded | — | Missing classes cannot be identified until current goods/services and the house-mark register are reviewed together. | House mark registered in 9/42 but core business classes (7,16,35,37,40,41) unfiled | UNAVAILABLE | External input | |
| Trademarks | Missing jurisdictions | No source loaded | — | Trademark coverage cannot be compared with revenue markets until both datasets are supplied. | Registered in X countries, selling in Y | UNAVAILABLE | External input | |
| Trademarks | House-mark defects | No source loaded | — | No house-mark defect is reported because prosecution and renewal histories are not loaded. | Lapses, address defects, unanswered office actions on the main mark | UNAVAILABLE | External input | |
| Trademarks | Third-party conflicts | No source loaded | — | Potential conflicts require current register searching and legal priority/confusion review. | Identical/confusing marks registered or applied by others, with enforcement priority per target | UNAVAILABLE | External input | |
| Trademarks | Counterfeits & unauthorized sellers | No source loaded | — | No listing is labelled counterfeit or unauthorized until marketplace evidence and client authorization are checked. | Marketplace listings and sites trading on the mark without authorization | UNAVAILABLE | External input | |
| Trademarks | Suggested filings | No source loaded | — | Filing recommendations wait for verified mark, class and country gaps. | Mark x class x country filing list with rationale | UNAVAILABLE | External input | |
| Trademarks | Enforcement plan | No source loaded | — | No enforcement target or action is recommended until conflicts, rights and prior-use risks are verified. | Per target: C&D / opposition / cancellation / takedown / monitor-only (with prior-use risk flags) | UNAVAILABLE | External input | |
| Investments0 live · 7 modules | ||||||||
| Investments | Patent flat fees | No source loaded | — | Client-specific patent flat fees are absent; the workbook cost library contains benchmarks, not the Photon quote. | New US filing / pending transfer / foreign filing / annuities - all-in prices with unlimited OAs and money-back | UNAVAILABLE | External input | |
| Investments | Trademark retainer | No source loaded | — | The verified monthly quote, quotas and exclusions are not present in the workbook. | $/month all-inclusive with monthly quotas (searches, filings, oppositions, notices) | UNAVAILABLE | External input | |
| Investments | Pulse platform | No source loaded | — | Idea capture and portfolio-dashboard functionality is described, but commercial terms must be checked against the proposal. | Free idea-capture + portfolio dashboard | UNAVAILABLE | External input | |
| Investments | Pilot design | No source loaded | — | Pilot duration, inventor count, specifications and OA commitments require a client-specific scope. | Free scoped pilot: inventors onboarded, ideas captured, N specs drafted, N OAs filed, weekly cadence, decision meeting | UNAVAILABLE | External input | |
| Investments | ROI summary | No source loaded | — | ROI is withheld until non-overlapping savings and the client-specific proposed spend are both verified. | Total savings identified across the audit vs proposed spend - prices the offer against the Cost club number | UNAVAILABLE | External input | |
| Investments | Governance | No source loaded | — | Governance should name one accountable partner, the update cadence and the approval process in the final proposal. | Single accountable partner, weekly update cadence, all approvals in Pulse | UNAVAILABLE | External input | |
| Investments | Roadmap | No source loaded | — | The roadmap requires dated actions, owners and measurable two-quarter outcomes before it can become a headline. | Numbered first-two-quarters plan ending in a measurable outcome (e.g. diligence score 45->90) | UNAVAILABLE | External input | |