Software Startups and Patents

There was very lively discussion tonight at @startvi on the, seemingly, blind requirement, for startup software companies to have patents. Rather that repeat the discussion here, let me summarize.
Patents do almost nothing for software startups, and do a lot of actual harm via the opportunity cost (in time and money) to gain an illusion of “defensible IP”.
Anyone requiring that a software startup has, or applies for, a patent earlier than one year before their anticipated exit either (a) doesn’t know software, (b) doesn’t know the software business or (c) doesn’t know the investment business.

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2 Comments.

  1. Hey this is a great article. I’m going to email this to my friends. I stumbled on this while googling for some free lyrics, I’ll be sure to come back. thanks for sharing.

  2. There you go, reaching people who you never intended to with that post DK

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