Posts Tagged: "Software"

Protecting IP in an Agile Software Development Environment

Over the last decade, there has been a movement among the software developer community to employ some form of “agile development” rather than the traditional software development methodology. The belief is that these agile methodologies lead to higher quality software and faster development cycles. More recently, the implementation of agile software development has transitioned not only from small startups to large companies, but also from enterprises developing noncritical, consumer apps to those developing software for medical, aviation, military, and financial systems, where the presence of errors pose high human or economic risk. With these transitions, intellectual property (IP) law practitioners must adopt their traditional lawyering approaches to capturing and securing IP (especially patent) rights. A failure to recognize and adapt to the agile software development environment will result in a failure of IP law practitioners’ essential job function—helping to create or sustain client profitability and enable long-term business growth.

Programmed computers are switching machines, and not directed to an abstract idea

A computer is a machine, yet there is an ongoing trend to “anthropomorphize” computers. That is: functions that are performed by humans are said to be able to be performed by computers. Anyone who has done any serious programming knows that is not how it works. Let me explain. Steps that humans can do almost mindlessly, for instance changing paragraph numbers in a text, may be excruciatingly difficult as programming steps. That is because computers are machines that process signals that follow very strict and inflexible routines that have no concept of what the signals mean.

Alphabet continues Google innovation in autonomous vehicles, e-commerce solutions

U.S. Patent No. 9180882, which is titled Avoiding Blind Spots of Other Vehicles, covers a method for maneuvering a vehicle protected here involves receiving sensor data collected along a roadway, detecting objects in the roadway from the data, identifying a set of objects relevant for blind spot detection, determining a blind spot area defining a lane space adjacent to a particular identified object and maneuvering a vehicle if it’s predicted that future locations of the vehicle would be within the determined blind spot area for any object. This technology is intended to both keep drivers safe on the road as well as improving the comfort of those drivers who might not want an autonomous or semi-autonomous car driving in their blind spot.

Software Patent Eligibility: Where is the Industry Heading?

”There should be no serious question that computer-implemented inventions such as software constitute patent-eligible subject matter under § 101,” Paul Clement wrote in a brief filed on behalf of IBM to the Supreme Court in 2014. Ultimately, the IBM brief would argue that the abstract idea doctrine is unworkable, which it is. Sadly, nearly 18 months after the Supreme Court’s landmark decision in Alice v. CLS Bank we are no closer to having a working understanding about when and under what circumstances software is patent eligible.

A patent conversation with Mark Cuban

CUBAN: I have invested in more than 150 companies and never has having or not having a patent impacted the final decision. Small businesses can and do become great without patents. The problem for little guys with patents is that no patent lives in a vacuum. Particularly with software and technology. There is always a work around and you can always find a patent that enables the big guy to sue the little guy. So with just few exceptions the current system doesn’t protect anyone.