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I am involved as a cofounder in a tech/software company. My associate is bringing initial funding and is conversant with finance/accounting, facilities/infrastructure and general organizational matters.

I will be bringing in the technology strategy and leadership, business strategy, initial business contracts as well as a stable of contacts with promise of business for the future.

I believe I have a well-worked out business vision and strategy, which, when executed, will work very well for us as the years pass.

Strategy or vision, while being essential for a startup, is rather abstract and invisible, except when executed properly to fetch revenues. However, I'd like to see if there is a way in which I can obtain and preserve credit for coming up with a well-documented business strategy which is a key component of my foundational input.

What instruments do I have for obtaining such protection? Copyright? Patent? What else?

Has anyone among you sought such protection for your business ideas before?

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Short answer: no, but...

Long answer: Sorry, there really isn't a tool in IP law to protect "business ideas". Practically speaking, though, it sounds like what you're looking for is attribution: recognition as the person who developed the style of doing business. One solution may be authoring some articles in influential trade magazines or presenting a paper on it at a conference.

Besides that, protecting the idea as a trade secret may be the only other option for you.

Copyright protects only fixed expressions of an idea; not the idea itself.

Trademark protects designations of origin: company or product names, colors, etc.

Patent theoretically can protect "business methods", but this is a very expensive and specific area which is under constant change lately, and thus uncertain.

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Got it, thanks! What I am looking for is recognition and attribution to me (from my co-founder) of my foundational efforts, which to me ought to translate into a foundational stake in the company, at the very least. – Aaron Smothers Mar 4 '11 at 1:22
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You're using weird words. Foundational stake? Make sure you have some ownership of the company (equity (also known as stock)), that's all you need to be rewarded for all your terrific leadership and vision and ideas, if they really work out. – Joel Spolsky♦ Mar 4 '11 at 4:01
I suppose you could tell this is my first genuine attempt at entrepreneurship. What I meant was founder's equity. – Aaron Smothers Mar 4 '11 at 23:10
+1 for an interesting take on how to establish "ownership" of an idea. – bogeymin Mar 10 '11 at 14:48
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As per the short answer above, no, IP law won’t protect a business idea or vision unless in your case that idea and the technology strategy you’ve come up with involves an invention (in which case you could make a patent application, but that will be expensive and time-consuming), or a business name or brand (eg like “Virgin” in which case you could apply for trademark protection) or the technology strategy involves eg specific software design that you’ve come up with in which there may be copyright.

But aside from that, there are things you can do and, in essence the most important elements of protecting your position are experience, judgement, leverage and timing and what you appear to be bringing to the table for the venture is not only strategy and management, but marketing and sales potential to help the business grow. If your co-founder recognises that, he or she should be willing to give you an equity stake (ie shares) in the business with maybe a potential uplift in your stake tied to performance; ie if you deliver, you can have more shares in the business. Rather than IP protection it sounds as if your situation is about negotiating a deal with your co-founder to protect the investment you will make in terms of time, effort and custom that you generate.

In any event, you should write up your technology strategy and plan for the business. You should then date and time stamp that at www.ProtectYourIdeas.com because that will provide unequivocal evidence of what you were bringing to the table at the outset. Memories are fickle and people forget what happened, so in law, robust evidence (with a 3rd party witness) can be important leverage at any stage of the relationship. Contact me at admin@protectyourideas.com if you want to discuss this further or need more help.

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Thank you John, this sounds quite useful! I'll take a look. – Aaron Smothers Mar 12 '11 at 4:32

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