MASTERCLASS Patents for Entrepreneurs – Part 6: Commercial Patents
Ola Wassvik pushes back on the common assumption that patent value mainly comes from suing someone. If you have to go to court to get value from a patent, something has already gone wrong. Patents should first be treated as a business asset, not a legal one, since most of their value shows up in credibility with customers, investors, partners, and acquirers, long before any courtroom is involved.
Key basics
As a sales tool, a patent signals that your technology is genuinely unique, which matters most to larger, risk-averse enterprise buyers. Their biggest fear isn't missing an opportunity, it's the risk of the deal going wrong, so weak IP protection often gets you quietly ghosted rather than rejected outright. On the investor side, weak or missing IP is one of the first red flags used to reject a pitch, and patents also attach the invention to the company rather than to individual founders, which reduces key-person risk.
The number of patents expected scales with how large a round you're raising: one patent might be fine at the earliest stage, but nowhere near enough for a hundred-million-dollar round. Patents also protect your margin directly, since a genuinely patented feature stops customers from playing you off against a competitor on price, and different patents can support different product tiers at different price points.
Strategy
Once a patent is filed, you're free to talk about it, and the smart approach is gradual disclosure rather than revealing everything at once, similar to a slow reveal rather than showing all your cards immediately. "Patent pending" should show up consistently on sales sheets, data sheets, your website, and in every sales conversation, though accuracy matters: use "pending" for filed-but-not-yet-granted patents, and "patented," "granted," or "covered" only once a patent is actually granted.
Strong IP also improves your odds with non-dilutive funding like grants, and it makes partnerships and collaborations far cleaner, since clear ownership avoids messy disputes later, especially since whoever files first is very likely to be recognized as the owner. The main mindset shift: your patent portfolio's primary users should be sales and the CEO, not just the CTO, and the questions to ask are how it helps you sell, raise money, negotiate better contracts, and scale, not how it helps you win a lawsuit.
About the Host
Ola Wassvik is CCO and co-founder of Lightbringer, a serial entrepreneur, and an M.Sc. in Engineering Physics. Before Lightbringer, he spent 20+ years as a tech entrepreneur, including as CTO and co-founder of Flatfrog.
Across that time he's managed over 300 patent families and helped raise more than €84 million for deep tech ventures, giving him a founder's-eye view of how patent strategy actually plays out in the room with investors, competitors, and boards.
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FAQ
Are patents mainly useful for suing competitors?
No. Most of a patent's value comes from sales, fundraising, and partnerships, not litigation. If you're relying on lawsuits to get value from a patent, that's usually a sign something else has gone wrong.
Why do enterprise customers care whether I have patents?
Because large buyers are primarily trying to avoid risk, not chase upside. A patent signals that your technology is genuinely yours and reduces their fear of you getting sued or copied mid-deal.
How do patents affect fundraising?
Weak IP is a common reason investors reject a pitch early on. Patents also attach the invention to the company rather than individual founders, and the size of portfolio expected grows with the size of the round you're raising.
Can I talk about my patents before they're granted?
Yes, as soon as they're filed, though disclosure should be gradual rather than all at once. Use "patent pending" for filed-but-ungranted patents, and reserve words like "patented" or "granted" only for patents that have actually been granted.
Who in the company should actually be using the patent portfolio?
Primarily sales and the CEO, not just the CTO. The CTO typically delivers the innovations and manages the filings, but the portfolio's main value shows up in sales and investor conversations.
DISCLAIMER: THIS IS NOT LEGAL ADVICE. YOU SHOULD CONTACT A PATENT ATTORNEY IF YOU NEED A FORMAL ASSESSMENT OF PATENT INFRINGEMENT OR FREEDOM TO OPERATE.
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