B
bob82
Guest
What is the name of your state? CA
I am a principal in a small software company and hopefully we will be getting some VC funding. The VC's want to check our IP so I started doing some research myself and was amazed at some of the absurd broad patents issued in the last 6 years. The way I read some of these patents we could be accused of infringing.
As I reviewed some recent software patents they are very extensive and describe an entire process (150 claims) rather than a specific function. In order to protect ourselves from not infringing on another companies patent I believe we need to submit a patent for the entire process. While traditionally a patent protected an inventor from copying, this extensive type of patent would not because it’s easy for someone to change parts of the process and we would have no case against them. It seems getting some type of patent in this day in the software industry is a part of the cost of doing business.
Is this a reasonable strategy?
I am a principal in a small software company and hopefully we will be getting some VC funding. The VC's want to check our IP so I started doing some research myself and was amazed at some of the absurd broad patents issued in the last 6 years. The way I read some of these patents we could be accused of infringing.
As I reviewed some recent software patents they are very extensive and describe an entire process (150 claims) rather than a specific function. In order to protect ourselves from not infringing on another companies patent I believe we need to submit a patent for the entire process. While traditionally a patent protected an inventor from copying, this extensive type of patent would not because it’s easy for someone to change parts of the process and we would have no case against them. It seems getting some type of patent in this day in the software industry is a part of the cost of doing business.
Is this a reasonable strategy?