08.14.18
Gemini version available ♊︎Lockton Insurance Brokers Exploiting Patent Trolls to Sell Insurance to the Gullible
Summary: Demonstrating what some people have dubbed (and popularised as) “disaster capitalism”, Lockton now looks for opportunities to profit from patent trolls, in the form of “insurance” (the same thing Microsoft does [1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20])
EARLIER THIS month (at the very start of it) Managing IP surprised us by speaking of “IP insurance”; there are actually companies out there that offer insurance from lawsuits over things that don’t even exist (unlike car accidents or natural disasters). We hadn’t quite seen this before. Then, only yesterday, San Francisco Business Times published this ‘article’ (more like an ad, ending with “Questions about patent infringement insurance for your company? Give us a call at 415-[redacted].”) and it was composed by Adam McDonough, “Executive Vice President, Lockton Insurance Brokers” (by his own words).
“They create threats and fears in order for them to sell their ‘solutions’.”So they’re now using/leveraging patent trolls for profit; they are selling the scam which is ‘insurance’ for patents. It’s similar but not identical to things like RPX, which nearly collapsed because patent trolls are on the demise/decline in the US. It’s a form of ‘protection’ money; they’re selling mercenaries in a village with the Mafia embedded in it; once the authorities weed out the trolls (the Mafia), demand for the mercenaries is no longer there.
The headline of the above article is “Patent insurance allows companies to focus on innovating, not competitors and trolls”; this is similar to Microsoft’s “IP Advantage”; Microsoft keeps feeding trolls while offering ‘protection’ from them.
If or when we spot more articles (ads) along those lines, we’ll surely point these out. It is ridiculous if not outrageous, and in some sense it’s an extension of a parasitic ‘industry’ akin to the one Black Duck is exploiting. They create threats and fears in order for them to sell their ‘solutions’. █
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