Startup patents issues
Last week we were awarded our third patent. These were early Fireclick patents (1999-2000) relating to web acceleration and predictive pre-download, they are a little special to me and my co-founders actually because they were the first patents we ever filed for Fireclick.
The patent process started in 1999 � during the bubble. We weren�t sure if our technology could really be patented, neither did we know if it was worth patenting. In all honesty we did it because �it had to be done� � spending the money at the time wasn�t too big of an issue for VC-backed startups. I remember our first meeting with the patent attorney, Steve Swernofsky, sometime in the summer of 1999. Stephane Kasriel (Fireclick�s co-founder) and I walked him through the main predictive caching ideas � at the time it was a little abstract because the technology had not been implemented yet. It was just a concept: using click-stream analysis to predict where users would go on a Web site and use a browser client (JavaScript typically) to pre-download content that was likely to be requested.
The meetings went well and we filed 3 or 4 patents on just predictive caching. Then over the years and as we morphed into a leading Web analytics company, we filed an additional 8-9 patents. At that point, the recession hit pretty hard and it was a little tough to justify new patent expenses. Patents do not typically have immediate returns and we really wondered why we spent so much time and money on IP, when the real urgency was to build a profitable company.
The jury is still out on the question of patents for start ups. Patents offer protection for startups but are seldom used for revenue generating purposes because the cost of enforcement is typically prohibitive for smaller entities. Also, they can be a distraction factor because these things do take time from the company brains.
Meanwhile, I think we did a fantastic job of bolstering our patent portfolio, with many more on the way. It�s always nice to get an email from your patent attorney saying �Good news, Patent 123 has been awarded!�. And it does a little something when you see companies like Google actually using some of “your” tech�