Veteran inventor in market float

Trevor Baylis is on a mission to help other inventors.

Trevor Baylis, the veteran inventor famous for creating the clockwork radio, is planning to float his company on the stock market.

The firm, Trevor Baylis Brands, supports inventors and aims to create a "culture of invention" in the UK.

An initial public offering in the firm is expected within a month on the 535X share trading platform.

The 535X provides share price and financial information for unquoted companies in the UK.

Trevor Baylis Brands was formed in September last year, and has already signed contractual agreements with more than 200 inventors who are asked to pay a nominal £100 for its services.

It helps people bypass the many legal and commercial minefields faced when trying to sell inventions.

'Pay-back' time

When an inventor approaches Trevor Baylis Brands, the company examines the idea to see if its intellectual property could be legally protected, whilst checking to make sure it is original.

Trevor Baylis is keen that new investors avoid the pitfalls he faced when trying to bring inventions to market.

After a career as a swimmer and stuntman, Mr Baylis came to prominence for inventing the Freeplay wind up radio.

A company was set up in Cape Town employing disabled workers to manufacture the radio and, in 1996, the invention went on to win a BBC Design Award.

However, the inventor maintains that commercially he did not get as good a deal out of his patent as he should have.

Freeplay disputes this and says the invention has left Mr Baylis a wealthy man.

But Mr Baylis feels very strongly that inventors need more help when dealing with what he calls "the corporate boys".

Keeping mum

Trevor Baylis wants the next generation of inventors to have a smooth ride to the market and suggests that subjects such as intellectual property and invention become part of the National Curriculum.

"If you can have a Bachelor of Arts, you can have a Bachelor of Invention," he said.

But one of the first lessons for young inventors is to learn that a bright idea is best kept to themselves, he said.

"If they tell people about their brand new ideas, they've lost it, it's in the public domain," Mr Baylis warned.

"If I'd known a bit about patents, copyrights and disclosure, I probably wouldn't have told everyone down the pub every time I had a good idea," he recently said.

"Now, if someone comes to me with a good idea, the first thing I say to them is: 'Don't tell me about it'."

His latest project looking for a route to market is a self-weighing suitcase aimed at travellers facing increasingly tight cargo weight restrictions at airports.

The idea, prototyped by Mr Baylis' long time collaborator, Professor Duncan Grant of Bristol University, is cheap to produce and effective but has yet to find a taker.