Crowdsourcing the Fight Against Tech Patent Trolls

Last year, Philips Electronics faced a potential legal challenge on its LED lighting products, and the company’s in-house attorneys had trouble formulating a viable defense. So the Dutch electronics giant turned to Article One Partners, a website where more than 27,000 researchers sift through obscure public domain materials including scientific papers, Ph.D. theses, and even product manuals to poke holes in legal claims—and possibly earn thousands of dollars.

Within days, New York-based Article One’s sleuths uncovered an older patent application that showed the claimant’s patent wasn’t original, says Ruud Peters, the chief intellectual property officer at Philips. Presented with the evidence, the claimant chose not to go to court. “Because of that, we could completely eradicate the assertion against us,” Peters says, adding that Philips paid Article One less than $100,000 for the service. “That’s small money compared with the millions you might spend on litigation.”