+1.970.776.4355 · Loveland, CO · Russ Krajec, principal Currently accepting Fractional Chief IP Officer engagements →

  • Patents Age Like Fine Wine

    We like to think about patents as call options on technology. With a call option, you have the opportunity, but not the obligation, to cash in the option before it expires.

  • Trading on the Differences

    Every time you see a news story or read a blog about a topic you know very well, it is amazing that the stories have lots of factual problems. This is not a problem, it is opportunity.

  • IP Valuation in a Regulatory Framework

    Regulatory requirements trump patents as the primary form of protection or moat[1] against a business.

  • The Government is the Worst Customer – and the Worst Investor

    We will always invest where Adam Smith’s “Invisible Hand” is pushing things forward, and avoid businesses where the regulator’s pen can wipe it out.

  • Handing the Keys to the Drunken Sailor and Hoping You Get Home

    Letting the CTO manage patent policy is bad for business.

  • Pitching Investors is Not “One-and-Done”

    I have the enviable position of seeing lots of inventors who bootstrapped their companies along before they take outside investment (if they take any outside investment at all). This is – without question – the single best way to build a business.

  • Registration Numbers

    When I review patent applications, I always download the full prosecution history of the patent from the USPTO. The prosecution history is the formal, legal record of the back-and-forth between the applicant and the Patent Office, and includes all the papers as originally filed, as well as the rejections from the examiner and the responses…

  • Waiting Room Inventors

    A friend who is an angel investor asked my opinion on a company. I did not like it for a number of reasons, not the least of which was their poor IP strategy.

  • Technology is always about firing someone.

    The value proposition of “technology” is usually that an employer can fire someone. It is always about doing more work with fewer people. This typically has a short term advantage for a business owner, but typically create poorer experiences for their end users over the long run.

  • Patents: An Imperfect System

    The patent system is a clunky, one-size-fits-all system.  It does not work for every invention or every industry, but the patent system as we know it has existed for over two centuries and industry has adapted.