Litigation Avoidance provides operating companies with a powerful tool to deter patent suits based on low quality patents. These suits are often brought by Non-Practicing Entities (NPEs).
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Litigation Avoidance
Litigation Avoidance is designed to help companies analyze and act on patents of questionable quality. Through the new service, Article One identifies pre-litigation patents and distributes requests to over one million scientists and technologists to research the validity of the patents.
Litigation Avoidance focuses on pre-emptive action around specific patents identified pre-litigation. By collecting more relevant information about prior art, Litigation Avoidance can make the patent system work more effectively and can help eliminate patents that do not deserve protection through USPTO reexaminations. As the community gathers more evidence, the service creates a network effect for all members to benefit from the research.
Microsoft Corporation is the first member of the Litigation Avoidance program.
"NPEs continue to actively target large technology companies and often with portfolios of questionable quality. Article One's Litigation Avoidance program is a powerful tool to fight this challenge. Litigation Avoidance gives businesses another tool to address patent quality issues prior to litigation to reduce risk and potential litigation cost. Together with other Litigation Avoidance members, we will be able to better address questionable patents in the pre-litigation phase to deter litigation. We are excited to add this to our patent defense strategy."
- Bart Eppenauer, Chief Patent Counsel at Microsoft Corporation
Crowdsourcing Solutions
“Clearly not all patents are created equal, and that is a painful, expensive problem for companies and ultimately the general public who has to shoulder the costs. Like services from companies such as RPX and AST, Article One Litigation Avoidance addresses the perfect storm resulting from increased NPE activity combined with serious patent quality questions and an overtaxed USPTO.”
- Cheryl Milone, CEO of Article One Partners