Feld Thoughts
http://www.feld.com/wp/archives/2008/03/entrepreneurial-companies-and-the-patent-system.html
I spent the afternoon at the Berkeley Center for Law & Technology. I’m on an advisory board for a new study on “Entrepreneurial Companies and the Patent System” being supported by the Kauffman Foundation. Tomorrow I’m speaking on a panel on the Symposium on Intellectual Property and Entrepreneurship.
It was a very productive afternoon. We spent several hours discussing the research project on Entrepreneurial Companies and the Patent System that is being led by Stuart Graham and Ted Sichelman. One of the areas Stuart and Ted are concentrating on are software patents. Doing real quantitative research on the impact of software patents is critical as much of the academic literature (economics, legal, and social science) is crap. The discussion was a robust one that I think was helpful to Stuart and Ted.
I’m impressed that the BCLT folks have put together a diverse advisory board – including a number of non-academic practitioners – to help them think through the best approach to this study.