Patent & R&D Operations — Domain Roles & Capabilities

The 5 default PATENTRD roles, the 16-capability catalog, and the Roles/Staff governance screens.

Domain Roles & Capabilities

Patent & R&D Operations ships out-of-the-box roles under the PATENTRD domain. Assigning a role to a staff member auto-grants that role’s capabilities as a domain “hat” — an employee can carry a PATENTRD hat alongside hats in other domains.

Out-of-the-box roles

Role	Purpose	Approver
Chief IP & R&D Counsel	Full authority across Patent & R&D Operations — approves FTO risk analyses, invention disclosures and IP valuations, owns the whole operation. Holds every PATENTRD capability.	Yes
Patent Registry Coordinator	Maintains the patent portfolio catalog, legal jurisdiction setup, technology taxonomy and inventor rights configuration.
FTO & Prior Art Analyst	Runs patent collision scans, prior art searches, freedom-to-operate risk analysis and claims matrix comparisons.	Yes
R&D Literature Researcher	Synthesizes academic literature, curates the research paper library, audits R&D project specs and reviews invention disclosures.	Yes
Grants & IP Valuation Officer	Tracks grant/incentive programs, manages tech transfer & licensing, audits R&D tax incentives and approves IP valuation/royalty terms.	Yes

Approver capabilities

Four of the five default roles carry approval authority somewhere in their capability set: FTO clearance (patentrd:fto:analyze), invention disclosure sign-off (patentrd:disclosure:review), and IP valuation approval (patentrd:valuation:approve) are all approver capabilities.

Capability catalog

16 capabilities, one per operational screen, all under the patentrd:* namespace:

Capability	Screen	Approver
`patentrd:portfolio:manage`	Patent Portfolio Catalog
`patentrd:jurisdiction:configure`	Legal Jurisdiction Setup
`patentrd:taxonomy:manage`	Technology Taxonomy
`patentrd:inventorrights:configure`	Inventor Rights Config
`patentrd:collision:scan`	Patent Collision Scanner
`patentrd:priorart:search`	Prior Art Search Engine
`patentrd:fto:analyze`	FTO Risk Analysis	Yes
`patentrd:claimsmatrix:compare`	Claims Matrix Comparer
`patentrd:literature:synthesize`	Literature Synthesis
`patentrd:paperlibrary:manage`	Research Paper Library
`patentrd:projectspec:audit`	R&D Project Spec Audit
`patentrd:disclosure:review`	Invention Disclosure Review	Yes
`patentrd:grant:track`	Grant & Incentive Tracking
`patentrd:techtransfer:manage`	Tech Transfer & Licensing
`patentrd:taxincentive:audit`	R&D Tax Incentive Audit
`patentrd:valuation:approve`	IP Valuation & Royalty	Yes

Roles & Staff governance screens

The Patent & R&D Roles screen uses the shared Roles shell (the same component every add-on uses): each role has a description and a resource-grouped capability picker built from the PATENTRD capability catalog above. The IP & R&D Team screen (staff master, title key prStaffTitle) is where roles get assigned to individual staff members.

Auto-grant & multi-hat

Selecting a role when adding staff attaches the role’s capabilities to the employee. An existing employee can carry a Patent & R&D hat alongside hats in other domains — e.g. a person can be both an R&D Literature Researcher here and hold a Legal role elsewhere in the same tenant.

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Frequently Asked Questions

Which role should I assign to a new patent paralegal?

Patent Registry Coordinator — it covers the portfolio catalog, jurisdiction setup, technology taxonomy and inventor rights, without approver authority over FTO or valuation decisions.

Can I create a custom role instead of using the 5 defaults?

Yes. The Roles screen lets an admin build any combination of the 16 PATENTRD capabilities into a custom role; the 5 seeded roles are a starting point, not a restriction.

Does a PATENTRD role grant access outside this add-on?

No — a PATENTRD role exposes only PATENTRD capabilities plus the GLOBAL capabilities every domain inherits (physical/operational basics).

Why do FTO Risk Analysis and Invention Disclosure Review both carry approver capabilities on different roles?

They’re independent sign-off points: FTO clearance is a market-launch decision (FTO & Prior Art Analyst), while disclosure approval is a filing decision (R&D Literature Researcher). Both route through the Chief IP & R&D Counsel role as well, which holds every capability.