Over the past four decades, trademark research has progressed from searching phone books and business directories to artificial intelligence (AI)-powered search tools and real-time trademark intelligence. Here at Clarivate™, Margaret Goldstein has contributed to that progress through her 40- year career with the company.
Hooked on trademarks
Margaret graduated from college with a degree in psychology, right in the middle of the early 1980s recession. A friend told her about a company in Boston, Thomson & Thomson, that was hiring graduates to do research.
“I was hired as a trademark analyst and was immediately hooked,” she recalls, noting that she was intrigued by the process of creating new brands and the impact they have. “I would do research on a trademark and then see it in the market a few months later. It was fascinating.”
That sense of curiosity has been a constant for Margaret as she has moved through a variety of roles over the years. Her career journey has enabled Margaret to touch virtually every aspect of trademark research—from content acquisition and analyst training to development of search algorithms, custom client solutions and product development.
“I have a unique and valuable perspective on the evolution of the trademark protection industry, having literally led or worked in almost every team that contributes to the products and services we deliver to our customers,” Margaret says.
Navigating the rise of the web
While she has witnessed many dramatic changes in the trademark industry, none have been as transformational as the emergence of the internet and the impact of technology on the trademark industry.
“I was involved in creating products built around the availability of information on the web. I focused on the operational and implementation side, helping define the tools and processes required to search the web effectively,” she explains. This then led into her role developing training to enable analysts to search this new category of unstructured data.
“Training was one of my favorite roles at the company,” Margaret says, noting that she particularly enjoyed teaching new analysts, leading them through the process of how a new brand becomes a trademark. “I enjoyed sharing my love of the industry and helping people understand the importance of what we do.”
Bridging technology and the business
Margaret also worked on pivotal projects with CompuMark™ colleagues in Antwerp, Belgium, partnering with knowledge engineers to develop a next-generation trademark search system still used by our analysts. “We focused on the business requirements, articulating to the technologists what the analysts needed to do their job.”
Today, Margaret is product owner of our analyst-led trademark search products. Here, too, she serves as a liaison between technology teams and the business to help implement the Clarivate search product roadmap. A key element of that roadmap is the integration of diverse datasets into Clarivate products.
“We’re able to incorporate information into our products that really enhances our clients’ ability to assess the risk of pursuing a trademark. This is a huge competitive advantage,” Margaret says, pointing to new Clarivate AI-powered Case Law Prediction Score as an example of this strategy. It combines trademark data with global IP case data—analyzed in real time by AI—in a single workflow, providing greater insight with greater efficiency.
Over the past four decades, Margaret has witnessed a sea of change in the speed of business—and contributed to solutions accelerating the trademark search process. “When I started in 1982, the standard turnaround for a full search was three weeks. Now we can deliver an analyst-lead search report in four hours,” she explains, noting that the quality of Clarivate human analysis is just as important to achieving this feat as the data and technology.
Linking our past with the future
Given her broad experience, Margaret has become the ‘go-to’ person for information and answers on anything trademark-search-related. She has unique institutional knowledge and experience, sharing with colleagues what has or has not worked in the past but rest assured, Margaret is focused on the future.
“I avoid getting stuck in the mindset of ‘that’s how we’ve always done it.’ You always need to move forward,” she says. “I try to bridge the gap, helping to guide the transition to new trademark solutions, while retaining the strengths that have made us an industry leader.”
Learn more about how Clarivate is applying AI to accelerate trademark research.
