Tech Firms Winning Troll Battle

Giants of Silicon Valley have turned the corner in their battle with patent assertion firms – also known as trolls – according to reporting by Reuters. The major cause: key changes in the legal landscape that make it easier to challenge the types of software patent lawsuits that troll firms have filed against tech firms for two decades. Patent prices are down, court battles have decreased, and the stock prices of many patent-holding firms have fallen. Since a key decision allowing software patents in 1994, firms that hold patents but do not create products have been increasingly litigious, responsible for more than 60 percent of the 6,000 patent lawsuits filed in 2013. But Congress began altering IP law in 2012, and in June the Supreme Court altered the landscape significantly with its Alice vs. CLS Bank ruling. For some, the results have been dramatic. “Their entire business model relies on intimidation, and that has lost its edge,” Efrat Kasznik, president of intellectual property consulting firm Foresight Valuation Group, told Reuters. “If the patents are not enforceable in court anymore… the troll has no legs to stand on.