Patents, trademarks, and copyrights are commonly known as “intellectual property” or IP. As occasional high-profile lawsuits between large corporations illustrate, IP can be extremely valuable, causing companies to budget significant amounts of money to acquire, defend, and assert IP rights. The concept of IP can be controversial, prompting various constituencies to condemn the entire idea (e.g., as dampening innovation or hampering individuals and smaller entities), or to object to the vast sums spent on high-profile lawsuits and their resulting awards/settlement.
Software patents are a waste of time and money. Or are they? A well-quoted statistic states that 97% of all patents will fail to recoup their filing cost. It’s also been said that half of all businesses will fail within the first 5 years, and only one third will see their 10th anniversary. However, there are an estimated 100 million new tech startups each year.
As our world changes, the world of intellectual property changes with it. Day by day, courts across the country are signaling that the tools and methods needed to protect such property are changing too. Those not paying attention run the very real of risk of getting left in the dust.
The following is a brief summary of the most important issues involved with protecting your copyrights when dealing with the government – specifically the Department of Defense (DoD) – either as a prime or subcontractor.
