About Barco

Barco is a Belgian technology company that specialises in digital projection and imaging technology. Barco employs 3200 employees, operates offices and facilities in 29 countries, and has a patent portfolio of more than 880 active patents and more than 480 pending patent applications.

Industry: Digital projection and imaging technology‍

ClaimWise champion: Marc Sader, Patent Team Manager

When Marc Sader joined Barco, he stepped into a complex portfolio of pending patent families - many drafted years earlier, across multiple technologies and jurisdictions. Understanding each invention, together with its prosecution history and strategic intent is essential, but time-consuming. ClaimWise became a way to bridge that gap.

The challenges that led Barco to use ClaimWise

Before joining Barco, Marc spent seven years in private practice after completing a PhD and leaving academia. Moving in-house meant a clear shift in how he worked with patents. Instead of drafting applications from the start, he has to take responsibility for a large number of existing patent families - many filed years earlier and across different technology areas.

This creates a few challenges.

1. Getting acquainted with new technologies is time-consuming

Understanding complex inventions across Barco's existing portfolio as well as competitor filings requires a lot of research. This means understanding what the invention covers, how it fits different products, and getting up to speed with the full prosecution history.

2. Understanding the details requires a lot of inventor face time

Before amending claims or responding to office actions, detailed input from inventors is needed just to understand the technology. This takes time from both the inventors and the patent team, creating scheduling bottlenecks and slowing response times.

3. There is often not enough time to review outside counsel work properly

Working with external patent firms for prosecution requires careful review of their drafts and internal discussion about the best way to respond to examiner objections. It’s a challenge to catch small errors such as missing or inconsistent use of reference numerals, and to identify big issues, such as lack of clarity and insufficiency of disclosure.

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How ClaimWise solves these challenges

Marc started using ClaimWise in September 2025 with a clear goal: to get up to speed quickly on Barco’s patent portfolio and take more ownership of prosecution work that would otherwise sit with outside counsel. ClaimWise addresses the key challenges in four ways:

1. Faster understanding of inventions and prosecution history

Instead of spending hours reading files or scheduling meetings to understand an invention, ClaimWise helps Marc quickly grasp what the application is about, how it has evolved over time, and what the examiner is objecting to. 

2. More focused and efficient inventor discussions

ClaimWise changed how Marc worked with inventors. Rather than asking broad questions, he can now bring concrete claim amendment options to the table. This allows inventors to react quickly and give targeted feedback, instead of spending time explaining the basics.

3. Clear guidance on amendment strategy

In many cases, ClaimWise helps identify the core intention of the invention. This reduces the risk of making strategic amendments that solves the examiner’s objections but weakens the patent by moving away from what commercially matters most.

4. Support for quality control work

ClaimWise also supports detailed review work under time pressure. For example, it helps to check clarity issues and test amendments before submission, making it easier to respond quickly when deadlines are approaching.

Office action responses now take hours, not days

The biggest change was speed. Office action responses that used to take several days now happen in a few hours. The time spent reading through applications, studying prior art, and coordinating both with inventors and outside counsel is significantly reduced. For Barco, ClaimWise handles the type of work they deal with daily. It gives them a solid starting point, informs strategic decisions, and allows them to work through cases faster without compromising on quality.

“Instead of taking me a whole day, it might take an hour. It really cuts things down from days to hours.

Looking ahead, as Marc is now engaged with inventions from their earliest stages, ClaimWise will enable him to provide strategic input early on. This early involvement ensures that each patent application is optimized from the start, reducing rework, and strengthening the overall patent portfolio.