Ray Bonnabeau is a partner with Hellmuth and Johnson and serves as chair of the IT and eCommerce Practice Group. Having practiced exclusively in the IT and eCommerce fields for over 15 years, his clients include businesses in the healthcare, financial and insurance industries. Ray has a wealth of knowledge relating to IT contracts, software licensing and he’s been an adjunct professor at William Mitchell College of Law teaching courses in both licensing and IP.
Typically, the most valuable asset to the tech startup is software code; therefore it is important to know just how copyright law works and how ownership of code is determined. I spoke with Ray for just under 30 minutes about these concerns from the developers/founders perspective.
A few of the questions we address:
By Ernest Grumbles, via Star Tribune
“On June 28, 2010, the U.S. Supreme Court issued its ruling in the biggest patent case in recent years, In re Bilski. The case related to the patentability of business methods (steps in accomplishing a business task) and has been a lightning rod in the intellectual property world (and elsewhere) during its long path to conclusion. These business method patents, typically directed to financial, Internet commerce, data analysis and business processes, are often written such that the particular machine or system used to perform the method is irrelevant. Bilski himself had tried to get a patent on various methods of managing hedge fund risk.”
It’s obvious that social media is here to stay as people are rapidly giving and receiving information about everything from companies to products to people. If you are developing social media applications that facilitate this form of interaction (to one degree or another), there’s some practical protections to consider.
Social media has been defined as a group of Internet-based applications that build on the ideological and technological foundations of Web 2.0, and that allow the creation and exchange of user-generated content. This is not to be confused with social networking which is a social structure made of individuals (or organizations) aka “nodes” that are connected by one or more specific types of common interest-although the two often go hand in hand.
Via Minneapolis-St.Paul Business Journal
“Piper Jaffray & Co. will pay a $700,000 fine after it failed to save about 4.3 million e-mails sent during a six-year period, the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority (FINRA) said Monday.
FINRA, a non-governmental regulator of securities firms, said the Minneapolis-based investment bank did not disclose that it wasn’t retaining the e-mails. The issue was discovered when FINRA requested documents as part of an investigation into a former Piper employee.”
On startups – entities, cap structures, securities, markets and more. Get to Know #14: Harold Slawik
Harold Slawik is a Partner with Minneapolis-based New Counsel, PLC, a law firm that is known for it’s work with entrepreneurs and startups in the Minnesota technology industry. Harold has extensive experience with private practice, as in house counsel for Sun Microsystems and with startup companies in both Minnesota and California. Harold is also an investor having started a private equity company that invests in software companies.
Why startups we wondered?
“We both (partner John Roberts) have had a lot of fun, that’s where the most fruitful experiences in our careers have been…it’s where we’ve both developed our experience and expertise. It’s been my exclusive focus since the mind 90’s and while there were a lot of law firms in this town doing tech stuff in the late 90’s during the boom days, after the crash, many of these firms cannot practice it to the degree that we do for the price that we do . There’s a market opportunity at our level.”
Harold shares with us his thoughts about what a startup company needs to do when starting and considering raising debt or equity financing; we’ve outlined the takeaways below:
Accelerant (n.): a A substance that is used as a catalyst to increase the speed of or to cause sooner than expected.
In an effort to better support Minnesota innovators and entrepreneurs, Minneapolis Law Firm Robins, Kaplan, Miller and Ciresi (RKMC) has developed and launched a suite of targeted legal resources specifically for the “sophisticated pre-money start-up”. The Accelerant program, which is generally limited to highly-skilled entrepreneurs with high-growth business models, aims to provide entrepreneurs with a systematic and cost-effective approach to the necessary legal componentry of their venture. As RKMC Partner and Accelerant initiator Kevin Spreng describes:
Kate Andresen is an attorney specializing in information technology and software licensing.
Kate began her own law practice, Andresen Law, PLLC over a year ago, prior to which, she was a partner with Bonnabeau Salyers Stites Doe Andresen (BSSD), a law firm specializing in IT. Notably, she has authored a treatise entitled The Law and Business of Computer Software.
Kate spoke with us about a few of the basics of contract law and why startup businesses need to pay attention to the legalese.
Here are a few of the questions we address:
Because many tech startup ventures-and the applications/products created-often begin with one person, or perhaps remain indefinitely owned by a single individual, LLC’s remain popular amongst early stage companies, Internet-based “lifestyle”, businesses or for-hire technicians.
According to Minnesota Statute , LLC’s can be owned and operated by a single natural person. Here are the basics surrounding the single member LLC in Minnesota:
Ann Treacy is formally trained as a Librarian and owner of Treacy Information Services. Currently, she is under contract with The Blandin Foundation for her research & writing services where manages and contributes to the BlandinonBroadband.org blog. In our estimation, Ann knows as much as anyone about what’s currently going on with the Minnesota Broadband situation at large. Join us for 30 minutes as we learn about Broadband in Minnesota.
Bonus:
Aggregated time line of Broadband Minnesota links; special thanks to Peter Fleck, TECHdotMN Networks Correspondent, for his assistance in compiling this information! Just leave a comment if we missed anything newsworthy/relevant from within the past few years.
Don’t have time to read the links? Well then you’ll just have to wait, watch and listen as distinct narratives play out for Minnesota’s Broadband future!
via William Mitchell College of Law,
“Under Secretary of Commerce for Intellectual Property and Director of the United States Patent and Trade Office (USPTO) David Kappos will visit the Twin Cities this spring to speak with entrepreneurs and innovators, and share his vision for a more innovation-friendly US patent system. Kappos, appointed by President Obama last October, will share his vision for improving the USPTO with the public at William Mitchell College of Law from 4:30 to 6 pm, Tuesday, April 6, 2010.
With innovation at the center of all scenarios for economic recovery, Kappos has said that intellectual property is the key to pulling out of the current recession.”
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Paul Godfread / legal
Paul Godfread is an attorney practicing in intellectual property and business law.
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