Earlier this week, intellectual property management solution provider Anaqua announced it acquired OP Solutions, a fellow competitor in the IP management tech space.

The financial terms of the acquisitions were not disclosed, but Anaqua noted it will continue to offer OP Solutions' Pattsy Wave IP management software alongside its other proprietary brands, which include IP management software AQX Corporate and AQX Law Firm, patent search and analytics tool AcclaimIP and mobile solution ideaPoint.

Anaqua CEO Bob Romeo said the acquisition will allow Anaqua to tap into a different segment of the law firm market. He explained that while Anaqua "is very strong on the corporate side" and also "plays very well at the high end of the market with big global firms that have multinational requirements," its products have not caught on with midsized and smaller law firms.

"What we find is that as you move downstream into the midsized law firms and some of the smaller specialized boutique IP firms, Anaqua is not the right solution. … We believe OP Solutions, with its flagship product Pattsy Wave, to be an excellent vehicle for us to drive into that market, not only in the U.S. but outside the U.S. as well," he said.

As part of the acquisition, OP Solutions CEO Spencer Siskind will step down from his position, and Anaqua will absorb all of OP Solutions' employees and expand the company's New York office. Romeo noted the goal is to "combine the OP Solution assets with the legal assets we currently have in the Anaqua side to create a much larger legal business unit within Anaqua." He added that the company intends to invest in Pattsy Wave "very heavily."

Anaqua's acquisition of OP Solutions comes almost three years after the company also bought IP technology provider Lecorpio and looked to tap into the demand for IP solutions in Asia.  Since then, Anaqua has found success in the market, with its IP product being picked up by Big Law firm Hogan Lovells and virtual firm FisherBroyles, as well as by corporations such as GM, Sony, Canon, and McDonald's.

When asked about how the IP market has been impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic and subsequent economic recession, Romeo said it's a "very resilient market because of value associated with IP." He added that "Anaqua is still growing very nicely through the downturn … [and] our strategy is to exit the COVID crisis stronger than when we entered."

Anaqua's acquisition of OP Solutions also comes amid other consolidations in the legal tech industry during the first half of the year. In January, for instance, Legility acquired fellow e-discovery provider Inventus, while KLDiscovery purchased e-discovery platform provider Superior Document Services Inc. The following month, e-signature company DocuSign acquired Seal software.