Patents & AI

When you hear the word AI - what are you thinking of? Software, data or Hardware? Well of the three the most easy to get intellectual property rights is hardware. You can get a patent! 

Software is harder to do. Things that are not patentable are computer programs, business methods or rules for playing games.

If you still want to protect your software, you will have to prove (and this means getting a good lawyer )that it is part of technical contribution: either utility or design. Patents only last for 20 years.

Normally you would get a copyright for a software code, but you could get a trademark (which protects the name or symbol - like the Amazon shopping cart symbol) or keep it a trade secret. 

Copyright remains for the duration of the copyright owner’s life plus 50 years, or for 75 years from publication, if the the software was created by the employee of a company. The Copyright Act, 17 U.S.C. § 101 defines computer programs as "literary works."

For a trade secret you need to show you are trying to keep it secret - like through employee and supplier contracts.

Examples of successful patents: Amazon "One-Click-Buy" software, U.S. Patent No. 5960411; The mp3 audio software, U.S. Patent No. 5579430

Microsoft has more than 90,000 patents applications! Check out Apple's patent here - reminds me of Google's Ara modular phone concept in the 2015!