Building a Defensive Publication Program

When you’re thinking about creating prior art to block competitors, you usually think about your company’s own patent applications. However, you can’t file a patent application on everything unless you have an infinite budget. You could also write an academic paper, but that still requires significant effort and may not be appropriate for ongoing software development. Defensive publications can fill the gap between a patent application and an academic paper. These defensive publications can impede competitors without the cost of a patent application or the time commitment of an academic paper. Elizabeth and Nathaniel were joined by Sabrina Chang, Senior Patent Counsel at Google, to talk about Google’s defensive publication program. Sabrina explained how the program was built, how AI can be used to keep costs down, and how the program helps recognize innovation across the company.