The quiet power of a patent
In a series of blog posts, Marco Coolen offers a glimpse into his work as a Dutch and European patent attorney at AOMB.
Published on February 15, 2026
Marco, a patent attorney at AOMB since 2013, shares his expertise on IO+ about patents—how they work, why they matter, and when they lose their value.
Not everything of value makes noise. Patents are a perfect example. They don’t need to shine in your marketing, be mentioned in every press release, or feature in every pitch deck. When they do their job well, you barely notice them. And yet they make a difference, every single day.
Patents are there to protect, not to provoke. You don’t have to file lawsuits. You don’t have to send letters. You don’t have to seek confrontation. They exist, they’re registered, and they quietly do their work.
Marco Coolen, photo © Bart van Overbeeke
Invisible, but tangible
Competitors see your patent. They think: “Can we work around this?” They calculate. They hesitate. And they decide: “Let’s not do this after all.”
You don’t hear that decision. You don’t get a notification. You don’t see a newspaper headline. What you do see is what doesn’t happen:
- A competing product that never appears.
- A service that suddenly disappears from the market.
- An investment that gets cancelled.
That is the strength of a patent as an invisible barrier. You don’t immediately notice that it works—until it’s gone.
You only see the value when it’s no longer there
When a patent expires, the playing field suddenly changes. New players emerge. Products start to look strikingly similar to yours. Margins shrink. Price pressure increases. And you find yourself thinking back to the time when everything felt stable.
That was your patent at work.
Without patents, you can be overtaken, copied, or pushed out of the market. With a well-placed patent, you keep control of your market—without constantly having to defend yourself.
Not a show pony, but a workhorse
A patent doesn’t have to be in the spotlight to be valuable. It’s not a trophy; it’s a tool. Good tools aren’t used constantly, but you definitely notice when they’re missing when you need them.
That’s why it makes sense to invest not only in visibility and innovation, but also in protection. Not everything has to be front and center. Some things are allowed to quietly do their job.
The lesson?
Don’t measure the value of your patent by the noise it makes. Measure it by what it prevents. By the peace of mind it gives you. It creates a room for you to operate without constantly looking over your shoulder.
Sometimes your most valuable asset is the one you don’t see every day, but that helps you every day. Patents can be exactly that kind of asset: invisible, until they’re no longer there. It creates a room for you to operate without constantly looking over your shoulder.
The World of Patents
Each week, Marco Coolen sheds light on an aspect of innovation protection.