Approvals Issues

The approvals process is the Achilles heel of licensing.

What is it?

Who is involved?

Why does it go wrong?

How can you manage it smoothly?

Under the terms of any licensing agreement, the intellectual property is ‘on loan’ from the licensor (brand owner) to the licensee (content provider.)

Every use made by the licensee of the brand - for products, services or marketing collateral of any kind - requires approval in advance from the licensor.

Network operators add complication, by taking the original materials and surrounding them with their own marketing collateral.

If anything is released into public view that a licensor has not approved in advance, they are entitled to insist that it is withdrawn.

When that happens, it means a lot of cost and hassle for the content provider and its customers.

Brand owners fear one thing above everything else – loss of control over their brand image.

To a content provider, the project may be the most important thing in the world, but for a famous brand owner it is merely one of many businesses.

If it becomes embarrassing, the brand owner is entitled to amputate it, before it infects the whole brand.

Going through approvals makes content development a lot harder. Under time pressures and with a lack of assets, it is very tempting to short-cut the licensor’s requirements.

Also, licensors can unreasonably reject approvals submissions, or contradict their comments from an earlier submission stage.

To transform pitfalls into potential, planning and communication is the key. Always try to follow these steps:

- Plan a production schedule that allows enough time for licensor approvals and stick to it;

- Licensee and licensor must meet at the beginning of the development process and explain clearly to each other what they need;

- Licensor must provide the best assets and guidance that it can;

- Approvals submissions should be made at 3 main stages: concept design, prototype and pre-production.

The licensor understands its brand’s strengths best and the licensee understands the mobile content market best. When the two meet in the middle, success is assured.