Blockchain Patents

[100bitcoin]

Based on regional publication estimate the patent holdings are below

• IBM - 240 Patent
• Rechain - 279 Patent
• WeBank - 282 Patent
• Nchain - 402 Patent
• Tencent - 724 Patent
• Alibaba - 1505 Patent

Was expecting BlockStream in this list.

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[Xembin]

I think some countries are trying to develop their self with the blockchain patents by identify their products with patent and to attract other to join the train.
 Any way blockchain is a decentralized in the world which no country control, compare to centralized where government has the power to increase and decrease at any time.

[bitsurfer2014]

Those patents are probably very specific use cases that don't necessarily conflict with Bitcoin. You can't patent anything that provably existed before your request, so existing crypto projects should be safe.

The question is whether it will stiffle innovation further down the road. However since software patents are not universally accepted it will be close to impossible to take legal action against any decentralized international project.

Well it could be the case, but on the contrary, there is a big possibility that some of those patented blockchain technologies had been used before by previous crypto projects who either forgot to apply patent or didn't care to bother since those are most likely open-sourced.

I just hope no legal issues will arise in the future concerning these patented blockchain technologies that may hamper further development on this emerging field. Imho.

If a technology has been provably used before any patent that follows it can be deemed null and void, regardless of whether the original creators patented it or not.

Once something is out there, it's out there. You can't patent something that is already commonly used.

Of course! The burden of proof will be on those who will challenge any approved patent and courts of law would  most likely favor towards the original creator / implementation of such technologies yet we should also be aware that there could be many technicalities in which both parties in a patent case can throw at each other - hence the possibility that it might hamper projects that utilise such patents in question.

Perhaps these approved patents as mentioned in the OP could be an "improvement" upon an original idea, algorithm or code which could be consider as an original intellectual property and this could be the reason why those patents are approved by concerned authorities.

[NotATether]

Perhaps these approved patents as mentioned in the OP could be an "improvement" upon an original idea, algorithm or code which could be consider as an original intellectual property and this could be the reason why those patents are approved by concerned authorities.

In that case the claimant can only file a patent for the improved version of the algorithm, not the original algorihm because it is not novel.

Here's an example: Some organization makes a new video streaming codec like H.265 that improves on other codecs like H.264. They can only file a patent on that newer codec, not older codecs or the video container (.mp4) itself, unless they also invented those codecs/containers.

Same principle applies to blockchain constructs.

[webtricks]

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take money due to fad and buzzwords,  taking advantage of executives who do not know what technology can or cannot do, does not mean much. These projects may be raising money now, but are they sustainable?

As soon as these executives see that the projects do not give any kind of the return they are expecting (actually, they might not even be expecting anything), they will cut funding and these start ups will disappear just as quickly as they emerged.

These executives work in Mergers & Acquisition department. Their work is to take over innovative projects then sell those services to other companies and governments. There is one thing they are expert in, "cost manipulation". They know how to sell stuffs. I was reading about a startup acquired by one such big MNC in India -

The service of this startup is to bring transportation cost involved in Supply Chain on-chain. It was pretty simple idea with a little tweak that transporter has to feed expense on blockchain at the time of incurring that expense with digital footprint of bill on the network. Hence, anyone in top-level management of the company can directly verify which transporter incurred which expense unlike previous system where transporters were claiming general transportation expenses from their seniors on estimation basis.

So the executives of this MNC prepared a cost-benefit analysis statement showing the saving in transportation cost the companies would make if they adopt their service. And guess what? This MNC currently have number of customers in Europe for this transportation cost blockchain service. LoL!

~snip~

Are there no seminars or webinars conducted there explaining blockchain to these executives?

There are actually. My friend told me that industry experts come to explain the newer technologies like blockchain tech, Big Data, AI, Machine Learning, etc. to his department regularly. But I have noticed one thing when I search articles or videos on 'blockchain technology' on internet. They go like - Blockchain Technology brings Transparency, Immutability, Decentralization, bla bla without actually explaining how those things are achieved! Now imagine a middle-aged executive having management degree and limited computer knowledge sitting in one such seminar. How would he receive those words? He would surely consider blockchain as some magical database which would automatically make everything saved on it immutable, decentralized and transparent.

[TedMosby]

a few days ago I discussed this topic with my friends on a local crypto media group.
they already have blockchain patents submitted in my country.
what I'm afraid of is, once "blockchain" patented generally as a brand or technology in each country, they can suing many people in this industry. and, maybe I am one of them, because I have a website with "blockchain" word 
CMIIW

[bitmover]

take money due to fad and buzzwords,  taking advantage of executives who do not know what technology can or cannot do, does not mean much. These projects may be raising money now, but are they sustainable?

This assumes that these projects aim for anything other than raising money. If raising money is your only goal you don't need to be sustainable.

I am not talking about planting trees or reducing carbon emictions lol

I am talking about companies being financially sustainable.

Those projects are receiving money now because someone thinks that they will give good money return after some years. But as soon as they realize those projects won't (as most blockchain projects are not making money now) they will just cut off that money supply. This is the sustainability i am talking about

[HeRetiK]

take money due to fad and buzzwords,  taking advantage of executives who do not know what technology can or cannot do, does not mean much. These projects may be raising money now, but are they sustainable?

This assumes that these projects aim for anything other than raising money. If raising money is your only goal you don't need to be sustainable.

I am not talking about planting trees or reducing carbon emictions lol

I am talking about companies being financially sustainable.

Those projects are receiving money now because someone thinks that they will give good money return after some years. But as soon as they realize those projects won't (as most blockchain projects are not making money now) they will just cut off that money supply. This is the sustainability i am talking about

I was also referring to projects being financially sustainable Good catch though, I completely overlooked the double meaning.

What I'm saying is that some projects are only after investor money, rather than trying to provide actual solutions.

And if investor money is all you care about, ie. your actual business model is just raising as much money as possible, then financial sustainability matters very little. In that case your project needs to be just barely sustainable enough that you don't get called out as the scam you are and that it floats long enough for the founders to gracefully exit the project.

Now I'm not saying that all buzzword projects start out like that, but I do have a suspicion that a significant portion of them is.

[bitsurfer2014]

a few days ago I discussed this topic with my friends on a local crypto media group.
they already have blockchain patents submitted in my country.
what I'm afraid of is, once "blockchain" patented generally as a brand or technology in each country, they can suing many people in this industry. and, maybe I am one of them, because I have a website with "blockchain" word  
CMIIW

Perhaps its not that easy to sue people for patent infringement because there could be many technicalities that could be difficult to prove and it could be likely that those submitted patents were proprietary technology / algorithms by those companies and there is nothing to worry about, not unless someone had deliberately copied that specific patented technology - in which he/she could be held liable for such acts.

Please don't get yourself stressed out, AFAIK I have never heard of someone being sued for using the word "blockchain" which is being absurd by the way.

[TedMosby]

Perhaps its not that easy to sue people for patent infringement because there could be many technicalities that could be difficult to prove and it could be likely that those submitted patents were proprietary technology / algorithms by those companies and there is nothing to worry about, not unless someone had deliberately copied that specific patented technology - in which he/she could be held liable for such acts.

Please don't get yourself stressed out, AFAIK I have never heard of someone being sued for using the word "blockchain" which is being absurd by the way.

I found alibaba submission for their patents in my country. they submitted it since may-nov 2018.
all of them is still on progress. should be announced in june 2020, but I cant find any update about it.

also..

I found a group of people who submitted a patent for "blokchain technology". that is blockhain in general though.
report said that it submitted since 2016, but no update as well.

in my country, something like this is an issue. back then, there was an issue about patents for word "open mic" and "roasting" 

[target]

take money due to fad and buzzwords,  taking advantage of executives who do not know what technology can or cannot do, does not mean much. These projects may be raising money now, but are they sustainable?

This assumes that these projects aim for anything other than raising money. If raising money is your only goal you don't need to be sustainable.

I am not talking about planting trees or reducing carbon emictions lol

I am talking about companies being financially sustainable.

Those projects are receiving money now because someone thinks that they will give good money return after some years. But as soon as they realize those projects won't (as most blockchain projects are not making money now) they will just cut off that money supply. This is the sustainability i am talking about

I was also referring to projects being financially sustainable Good catch though, I completely overlooked the double meaning.

What I'm saying is that some projects are only after investor money, rather than trying to provide actual solutions.

And if investor money is all you care about, ie. your actual business model is just raising as much money as possible, then financial sustainability matters very little. In that case your project needs to be just barely sustainable enough that you don't get called out as the scam you are and that it floats long enough for the founders to gracefully exit the project.

Now I'm not saying that all buzzword projects start out like that, but I do have a suspicion that a significant portion of them is.

Isn't this patents are just for the trademark purposes?

Certainly any developers can develop further any project that has been existing which even if its copied but had been developed further, there wouldn;t be an issue but maybe they will just sue base on the names or probably logos and designs. Other than these, it will just be hard to prove whether they entirely copied the project.