{"id":1963,"date":"2015-01-28T10:11:04","date_gmt":"2015-01-28T09:11:04","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/startupxplore.com\/en\/blog\/?p=1963"},"modified":"2015-01-28T10:11:04","modified_gmt":"2015-01-28T09:11:04","slug":"startup-patents-in-europe","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/startupxplore.com\/en\/blog\/startup-patents-in-europe\/","title":{"rendered":"Software patents in Europe: how do they affect startups?"},"content":{"rendered":"

For a long time, software patents were the talk of the town. Especially in the US, many tech corporations and patent trolls used software patents to defend their businesses. Or even worse, in some cases to attack other people\u2019s businesses without having much to offer besides a patent.<\/p>\n

There\u2019s a reason why this has been happening mainly in the US and not in Europe: software patents *per se* do not exist in Europe. They only exist under certain circumstances that we will explain later in this article.<\/p>\n

Many entrepreneurs and investors from overseas have vividly complained over the years about the current patent situation in the US. To no avail. Software patents continue to be enforced by shadow companies in an effort to make money out of nothing. Something that could also impact European startups launching in the US.<\/p>\n

Patenting software in Europe<\/h2>\n

As this excellent article from The Next Web<\/a> points out, the UK and most European countries are part of the European Patent Convention. A convention that sets the framework for the patent industry in the old continent and that specifically excludes \u201ccomputer programs as such\u201d from being patentable.<\/p>\n

What this means is that the vast majority of software developed in Europe is not patentable. There are, however, a few exceptions. When a computer program solves a business problem using a computer, it\u2019s not patentable. If that same invention solves a technical problem it can indeed be patentable.<\/p>\n

As Wikipedia\u2019s article on European software patents<\/a> notes, \u201cthe fact that an invention is useful in business does not mean it is not patentable if it also solves a technical problem\u201d.<\/p>\n

Nuances and differences between countries aside, the reality is that the vast majority of software produced in Europe can\u2019t be patented. Which, considering the situation in the US, is good news for most startups and tech companies in the EU.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s also worth noting that the fact that software patents are not common in the UE doesn\u2019t mean that local companies don\u2019t patent their inventions. As highlighted on a infographic<\/a> from James Sherwin, Partner at law firm SOR Solicitors<\/a>, 66,712 patents were granted in Europe in 2013.<\/p>\n

\"patents<\/a><\/p>\n

Amongst the most active companies in the space we found giants such as Samsung, Siemens, Philips or LG, who have patented many inventions in the fields of medical technology, electrical machinery or digital communication.<\/p>\n

What happens when European startups move to the US?<\/h2>\n

\"software<\/a><\/p>\n

The fact that software can\u2019t be patented in Europe does not mean that when European startups move to the US they can\u2019t be sued by American companies who have the right patents and the money and lawyers to go through the whole process.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s also true that there haven\u2019t been many cases of local startups that have been sued by American competitors (or patent trolls) in an effort to difficult their expansion plans, but it could be done, and this causes some startups to think twice about opening shop overseas.<\/p>\n

As highlighted in the \u2018Startups and Patent Trolls\u2019 paper from Colleen V. Chien (Santa Clara University – School of law)<\/a>, software patents can make it harder to innovate and they can scare European startups away from the US.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe have limited ourselves to the UK & European markets, simply because the mere threat of Patent Litigation if we enter the US market, is a WHEN not IF question.\u201d Another said \u201cI used to develop software for retail and on spec for publishing by other companies. But we’ve quit that because the risk of patent litigation.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Software patent discussions peaked in 2011 in the US, but they haven\u2019t disappear since and, if placed on the wrong hands, could still put some European startups in danger once they enter the US market.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

For a long time, software patents were the talk of the town. Especially in the US, many tech corporations and patent trolls used software patents to defend their businesses. Or even worse, in some cases to attack other people\u2019s businesses without having much to offer besides a patent. There\u2019s a reason why this has been […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":9,"featured_media":1968,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[50],"tags":[67,105,55],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/startupxplore.com\/en\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1963"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/startupxplore.com\/en\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/startupxplore.com\/en\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/startupxplore.com\/en\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/9"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/startupxplore.com\/en\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1963"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/startupxplore.com\/en\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1963\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1971,"href":"https:\/\/startupxplore.com\/en\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1963\/revisions\/1971"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/startupxplore.com\/en\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1968"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/startupxplore.com\/en\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1963"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/startupxplore.com\/en\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1963"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/startupxplore.com\/en\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1963"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}