About Unitatis

Unitatis was founded in 2017 by qualified commercial pilot Julian Price to enhance flight safety by pioneering new training methods to create realistic, relevant and immersive Air Traffic Control Officer (ATCO) learning experiences using fully remote solutions. Julian is an active commercial pilot with 30 years’ flight deck experience; he was also trained as a BBC television broadcast engineer.

Julians aim in setting up Unitatis was to provide ATCOs with a much better understanding of the challenges facing aircraft flight crew by using video filmed in flight simulators with real pilots and also featuring real controllers. These videos are backed up with webinars featuring presentations with live video, online polls and breakout rooms.

Modules cover topics such as engine failure, aborted take-off, emergency descent, avoiding dangerous weather conditions and avoiding collisions. They highlight flight crew workload, time factors and complexities of the procedures involved for pilots.

The challenge

Working in association with Swiss Air Traffic Control (ATC) and SkyGuide, Unitatis created a training package which consists of several online training modules, a learning management system, live Zoom talks and pdf books. The online training modules are made by shooting video in flight simulators. This video is then edited into an online module with information and graphical elements overlaid, together with a quiz.  

Julian Price realised that the process of creating the training modules and related elements had created a significant intellectual property and intangible assets, and that the company needed advice on how best to manage and further develop the resulting IP.

The solution

Julian was introduced to IP experts Inngot by Innovate UK EDGE. Inngot suggested that Unitatis should apply to the UK’s Intellectual Property Office for funding under the IPO-administered IP Audit Plus Scheme so it could catalogue its intellectual property and related intangible assets and identify any issues relating to them that needed to be addressed.

Having secured the funding, Unitatis commissioned Inngot to conduct an IP audit which resulted in a number of suggestions for strengthening its IP and managing it strategically in the future.

These suggestions included: registering trade marks in the UK and also in relevant overseas territories; get any third parties involved in creating copyrightable assets to assign their rights to the company; set up systems to monitor for potential copyright infringement in its IP, and ensure relevant attributions are made, or a licence is obtained if necessary; explore the potential for patenting novel and inventive technologies for delivering training it may develop; explore the possibility of claiming R&D tax credits for its technology development.

The result

Julian Price says: “We learnt the importance of IP and about understanding what you’ve got and being clear about who owns it and also how we can avoid infringing on other people’s IP. We acted on Inngot’s recommendations and asked all of our contributors to sign an agreement to transfer any IP rights to the company.”

“Inngot also gave us some very useful advice on how we film our modules – for example, we shouldn’t use or show any manuals created by other organisations in them, and focus on generic piloting.”

Unitatis has also strengthened its procedures for recording company knowledge and trade secrets.

Inngot’s IP audit was far-reaching and eye-opening. I never realised how much IP the company had created, or how contentious issues like copyright can be. I was impressed by the team’s expertise and attention to detail, and I would definitely recommend them.

Julian Price - Founder