Intellectual Ventures is a private company founded in 2000 to invest in "pure invention." Its goal is to develop a large patent portfolio rather than to actually develop new systems. Its employees are predominantly patent attorneys, physicists, engineers and biotechnologists .

Intellectual Ventures was founded by Nathan Myhrvold of Microsoft and Edward Jung. They have raised $350 million from many large companies including Microsoft, Intel, Sony, Nokia, Apple, Google and eBay. They have purchased in excess of 1,000 patents. Investors gain protection from being sued over these patents, but the Intellectual Ventures intends to impose royalties on other companies.

See also

• Eolas

External links

• Intellectual Ventures Main web site.
• Newsweek Article Main source for this article.