Your Patent Attorney Is NOT Giving Business Advice

Are you getting a list of options or a strategy that aligns with your business? Is that “strategy” more tailored to the Law Firm’s billing or your success?

Most inventors think that hiring a patent attorney means they’re protected. That’s a mistake.

Patent attorneys are trained to give you every possible option. Want a provisional? Sure. Want to file a PCT? That’s on the table. Want to abandon and refile? Absolutely. They’ll lay out a menu of choices — but they will never tell you which one is the right one for your business.

Why not? Because that’s not how the system works.

They’re not paid to make strategic recommendations. They’re paid to document your inventions and push the paper through the USPTO. Their ethical obligation is to file what you ask them to file — not to counsel you for what’s in your best financial interest.

The Illusion of “Informed Decisions”

Patent attorneys honestly believe that if they give you a list of options — with some boilerplate risk language — they’ve fulfilled their duty. It’s how they shield themselves from liability.

They’ll say:

“Here are twelve ways you can handle this. Each has pros and cons. You decide.”

That feels like professional advice. It’s not.

It’s a legal CYA move. By presenting every option, they’re not committing to anything. They’re avoiding responsibility. Because if things go sideways, they can point back and say, “You were informed. You made the call.”

But let’s be honest: most entrepreneurs don’t know what any of those options actually mean in a business context. That’s why they hired an expert. And instead of advice, they got a spreadsheet of choices with footnotes.

When I worked for a local patent attorney decades ago, he emphasized never, never, never giving business advice. We were commanded to explain every option in detail (we were billing by the hour), then document whatever they “decided.” The problem was that the client was always asking for advice, not options.

Why Provisional Patents Are the Perfect Example

One of the most common pieces of “advice” is to file a provisional application first. It sounds cheaper and faster. But it’s not strategy — it’s a stalling tactic. And worse, it often costs more in the long run.

Here’s what happens:

• You file a provisional to “hold your place.”
• A year later, you scramble to convert it to a non-provisional.
• Hopefully – from the patent attorney’s standpoint – we find something to change in the patent application.
• You’ve spent money twice — and may have weakened your position.

Why was this suggested? Because it splits the bill into two parts. The law firm collects now and again later. From their perspective, that’s two billing events. From yours? It’s a delay that increased cost and complexity — with no added value.

Let’s Be Clear: This Is About Billable Hours

The list of options isn’t about helping you. It’s about giving the law firm flexibility — and deniability.

Suggesting a provisional means they’ll bill you again in 12 months. Want foreign rights? File a PCT. Want to go into Europe, China, and Canada? Great. More filings. More bills.

This isn’t always malicious. Most patent attorneys genuinely think they’re doing the right thing by explaining “options.” But the structure is set up so that more work = more revenue, and the easiest way to generate more work is to give you more decisions — each leading to another invoice.

Malpractice Liability is Extreme in Patent Law

One of the things I never appreciated when I was an inventor was the huge liability risk that patent attorneys face.

Patent attorneys have malpractice exposure that is far, far greater than most attorney

If a patent attorney give you business advice, and they are wrong, you sue them for malpractice.

If they say “get a patent” and they are wrong, their exposure is the cost of a patent, maybe $30,000.

If they say “do NOT get a patent” and they are wrong, their exposure is all your lost profits – in every country of the world – for the next 20 years.

This liability exposure is so enormous that virtually all patent attorneys fall back on the practice of explaining all your “options” and making you pick – even when they know the best strategy for you.

Who’s Responsible for the Outcome? You Are.

When your patent ends up being worthless, the law firm shrugs.

“You made the decision. We just presented the options.”

And technically, they are right. But what you needed was someone who said:

“Given your product, market, and funding stage, here’s the strategy that gives you leverage and minimizes cost.”

You didn’t need a law firm. You needed a partner.

What Real Patent Strategy Looks Like

Real strategy doesn’t give you a menu. It gives you a recommendation — backed by business logic, not legal boilerplate.

It sounds like this:

• “Never file a provisional. File a utility and get early examination.”
• “The sooner we get feedback from the examination process (such as PCT search report), the better informed we will be about our IP and our strategy.”
• “Have as much examination done as possible before determining which country to enter National Phase.”
• “Design around our own patent to determine how someone can work around it.”
• “Determine the reason why someone bought our product to determine what to cover in our patent.”
• “We do not want to patent an idea just because it is cool, we want a patent that is enforceable and detectable.”

This kind of advice comes from someone who understands your business, your market, your funding environment, and your exit strategy.

But that kind of insight doesn’t come from an attorney billing hourly. It comes from someone who has skin in the game.

Things are Different From BlueIron’s Perspective

At BlueIron, we don’t get paid to churn filings. We get paid when your patents are valuable.

That changes everything.

We treat patents like financial assets — because they are. We fund them, underwrite them, and manage them like investments. That means every decision — what to file, when to file, what to claim — is driven by business value, not legal tradition.

We say no to bad ideas. We kill unnecessary filings. We design your portfolio to support your actual growth, not just your ego.

If we recommend a strategy, it’s because we’re putting our money behind it.

A Final Word

Patent attorneys aren’t broken. They’re just operating in a system that doesn’t reward strategic thinking. It rewards billing.

So when you get a list of options with no clear guidance, understand what’s really happening:

• It’s legal liability avoidance.
• It’s a path to more billable work.
• And it puts all the risk — and all the responsibility — back on you.

If you want more than that, you need someone aligned with your outcome.

Because a list of options isn’t strategy. It’s abdication.

You deserve better.