I’ve Reviewed Many Patent Portfolios. Here’s What Makes One Worth $100M

I once represented a company that had nothing but patents.

They sued big players who refused to settle and filed reexamination on every single patent. We defended them successfully. The result? A licensing deal worth over $100 million.

Their valuation jumped overnight.

But here’s what made those patents valuable: strategic claim drafting from day one. Every independent claim captured a key inventive feature. Every patent was filed with leverage in mind.

Most founders never get there. They accumulate patents the way people collect business cards at conferences, reactive, unfocused, and ultimately useless when it matters.

I’ve reviewed portfolios with 50 and more patents that provided zero competitive advantage. The problem wasn’t the quantity. It was the complete absence of strategy.

Patents Are Static. Your Product Isn’t.

Here’s the trap I see constantly:

A founder files a patent. It gets granted. They move on. The patent sits in a portfolio somewhere, slowly becoming irrelevant as the product evolves.

Patents capture your product at a single point in time. They document what you built, maybe some variations, and that’s it. Meanwhile, your product changes every quarter based on customer feedback, market demands, and competitive pressure.

A patent strategy that was valuable three years ago may have minimal or no value today if your product has evolved beyond what those claims actually cover.

This is the “file and forget” problem. It’s expensive, it looks good in investor decks, but it creates zero leverage when you need it.

The alternative? Patent strategy that evolves with your product roadmap.

The Six Questions I Ask Before Any Founder Files

I run every founder through a diagnostic framework before we talk about filing anything. These questions separate strategic patents from expensive paperwork.

1. What is the primary business objective behind obtaining patents?

Market control? Increasing valuation? Attracting investors? Licensing optionality? Competitive deterrence?

Patents are tools, not trophies. Different objectives require fundamentally different strategies. Claim scope, filing jurisdictions, portfolio structure, and budget all change depending on what you’re actually trying to accomplish.

Without clarity here, filings tend to be unfocused and fail to create leverage during fundraising, partnerships, or exit conversations.

2. Have you publicly used, shown, sold, or otherwise disclosed the invention?

Public disclosure is the single biggest hidden risk in patent strategy.

I recently spoke with a founder building a home improvement tool. During our strategy session, I learned the product had been publicly displayed and sold more than a year ago. No significant improvements had been made since.

US patent protection was impossible.

My advice? Forget the patent. Focus on first-mover advantage and name recognition. Yes, competitors may enter the space and benefit from your success. But at least you have a head start and can capture significant market share.

Demos, pilots, customer trials, press releases, conference talks, all of these can destroy patent rights or force rushed, weak filings. This question determines urgency and filing type.

3. What are the key technical aspects of the invention, and which actually provide market advantage?

Not every technical feature is worth patenting.

Strong patents protect leverage points, architectures, workflows, or system-level advantages that competitors can’t easily avoid. This question separates “interesting technology” from “strategically protectable value.”

According to recent research, a few high-quality, impactful patents can outperform large portfolios. Patent quality has become the new gold standard.

4. Who are the current and likely future competitors, and how do they operate?

Patent strategy doesn’t exist in a vacuum.

Understanding competitors shapes claim breadth, helps identify white space, and determines whether your patents will actually influence behavior. Sometimes your product doesn’t change, but you see an opportunity for defensive filing.

For example: you notice a competitor moving into a space void of patents. A few strategic patents in that area can become a gold mine for licensing purposes down the road.

5. What are the most realistic design-arounds a competitor could use?

If competitors can easily design around your patent, it won’t provide leverage, even if it’s granted.

As seasoned patent attorneys, we’re experienced in identifying design-arounds. I pose this as a strategic question during IP strategy sessions. Even if founders haven’t thought about it, the question makes them think like a competitor in real time.

Often, they’ll say: “Yes, that alternative is actually possible. Even though it’s not our current implementation, it’s worth protecting from a design-around perspective and for future licensing deals.”

This thinking improves claim drafting and reveals whether broader protection is achievable.

6. How does timing align with your product roadmap, fundraising plans, and go-to-market timeline?

Timing drives everything: when to file, what to file, and how much to invest.

A patent strategy misaligned with product launches or fundraising milestones often fails during diligence. This question ensures IP strategy evolves in lockstep with business reality, not after the fact.

When a Patent Isn’t the Answer

I had another conversation with a founder whose idea was best protected as a trade secret. Reverse engineering wouldn’t have been possible.

Trade secrets are a much cheaper alternative. They last as long as you can keep them secret. Patents are expensive to obtain and only last 20 years.

Sometimes the right move is not filing at all.

Research shows that firms face a trade-off between the quantity and quality of their research output. More isn’t always better.

The reactive “invention-driven” process leads to low-value patents. Companies obtain patents on inventions that don’t provide significant value, patenting something not used in any of their products, for example.

Type A vs. Type B Founders

Type A founders treat IP like a checkbox. They file when investors ask about it. They accumulate patents without reviewing whether those patents still align with their current product or competitive landscape.

Type B founders treat IP as a living strategy.

They routinely communicate with their patent attorneys and keep them informed of their product roadmap. They involve counsel in product planning meetings. They conduct quarterly patent portfolio reviews to determine whether strategy needs updating based on their current product and what they’re seeing from competitors.

Type B founders understand that patents are about framing. When done strategically, patents help you tell the story that your product is unique and defensible. This places you on a different level during funding, valuation, and exit conversations.

The 18-Month Product Vision Framework

Here’s the step-by-step process I use with strategic founders:

Step 1: Map the product roadmap
I ask founders to identify their product roadmap for the next 18 months. Then I work on identifying a patent filing strategy that matches that roadmap. At this stage, I’m creating a timetable for possible patent filings.

Step 2: Strategic advantage filter
For each potential filing, I ask: Does this provide strategic advantage? Does it serve the business objectives we outlined at the beginning? If it doesn’t, drop it. If it does, move to the next step.

Step 3: Focused patentability search
We conduct a focused patentability search to look at the landscape and determine chances of success. This step prevents wasted spend on patents that won’t create leverage.

Step 4: Post-search strategic filter
After the patentability search, we ask the question again: In view of the prior art discovered, can we get reasonable protection that still provides market advantage? If no, drop it. If yes, proceed with drafting.

Step 5: Continuous review
Once the application is filed, review the strategy to see if it needs adjustment based on product changes or new developments from competitors. Consider one or more continuations or new applications if needed.

This double-filter approach—before and after patentability search—prevents the accumulation of decorative patents.

What Leverage Actually Looks Like

Strategic IP work creates your investor narrative.

When you begin creating patents with strategy in mind from the beginning, you’re writing the story of why your product is unique. That translates directly into IP momentum slides.

You’ve already answered the hard questions: What is being protected? Why is it being protected? Where is it being protected? What strategic value does it align with?

When you get into difficult investor meetings and questions come up: Did you do a patentability search? Did you do a freedom-to-operate investigation? Do you know what competitors are doing? Do you have an alert system for competitor filings?  The answer is ready.

You’re not reactive. You show proactiveness and strategic vision. This differentiates you from peers who treat patents as a checkbox.

For investors, a robust patent portfolio signals credibility and long-term potential. One patent can demonstrate innovation, but a portfolio of related patents shows that you’ve thought strategically about adaptability, scalability, and competitive advantages.

The Quality Problem Nobody Talks About

Large patent portfolios often benefit from size rather than quality. For example, research comparing major chemical companies shows that DuPont’s patent portfolio has lower average technology relevance than those of Dow and BASF, despite DuPont holding a significantly larger number of patents. In other words, volume did not translate into greater competitive impact.

This gap shows up in practice. Companies with large patent portfolios can still struggle to secure financing or improve valuation because low‑quality or misaligned patents do not meaningfully change bargaining power. Investors and acquirers care less about how many patents a company owns and more about whether those patents actually protect the company’s core technology, constrain competitors, or reduce risk.

The problem often starts at the source. The patent system itself rewards throughput and timeliness more than strategic depth, which can encourage a quantity‑over‑quality mindset. But that systemic incentive only becomes a problem when companies adopt the same mindset internally, filing reactively, rushing applications ahead of public disclosures, and treating patents as checkboxes rather than long‑term assets.

The result is a growing number of patents that exist on paper but provide little real leverage. These patents may be legally valid, but they are easy to design around, poorly aligned with how the product actually evolved, or disconnected from competitor behavior. In those cases, ownership alone creates no advantage.

A simple test applies: if a patent does not change anyone’s behavior, competitors, investors, or acquirers, it isn’t defensive. It’s decorative.

The Real Question

Most founders ask: “How many patents do we have?”

The real question is: “Does each patent create leverage?”

Strategic patents read on competitor activity, not just your own product. When your objective is to increase valuation, it’s important to know what competitors are doing and ensure your patent covers their activity. You’re not only protecting your own product but also generating a premium for your business.

Quantity without strategy is just expensive paperwork.

The companies that win are the ones that treat patents as living strategy, reviewed quarterly, aligned with product roadmap, and designed to create leverage when it matters most.

That’s the difference between a portfolio that looks good in a deck and one that commands a nine-figure licensing deal.