Innovation

Software patents stifle innovation by impairing the single most important incentive for innovation: a competitive market with low entrance barriers.

The patent lobby often makes it sound as though patents were the reason why companies innovate. Unfortunately, there are still politicians who haven't understood that this is a fallacy. The number one reason for companies to innovate is not to obtain some legal document but to be more successful in a competitive marketplace.

If software patents were legalized, the market would become much less competitive. Today's market leaders would get a legal weapon against open-source software, enabling them to arbitrarily define which technical features they reserve for themselves. They would use their patent arsenals to hamper small and medium-sized companies in their development. The net effect would be that a cartel of large corporations enters into cross-licensing agreements and shares out the software market among that group.

There is no question that sound innovation policy requires the legal protection of intellectual achievements. That's why software is protected under copyright law. Patent law, however, has little to do with protection. To the contrary, patent law poses a huge risk to true innovators because their independent creations can be attacked by racketeers and malicious competitors.

Innovation is not the task of lawyers and bureaucrats. The patent system absorbs financial and human resources that the software industry can much better spend on product development. Every Euro spent on a lawsuit is a Euro not spent on development. Every hour spent by a programmer providing input to a patent attorney is an hour not spent on development. The overhead of a very expensive patent system is not justifiable since copyright law has proven to foster innovation and to truly protect the rights of software developers.

Click here to read why software patents are a threat to IT security and stability