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Building An Asset, Being Strategic, Learning Important Lessons

Since shifting out of a pure-play service company to building a product-led  company, I am now seeing what it is to be strategic.

In building a product, you are investing in an asset. Investing in an asset forces you to make strategic decisions since the product features define the course and goals for a company. When resources are limited, decision-making needs to be better since the direction these decisions impose on your company's direction are costly to undo.

Bootstrapping the development Knowledge Leaps for the past three years has been eye-opening and a great learning opportunity. The top lessons learnt so far are:

  1. Don't invest money in features that don't make it easier to use the product, today.
  2. Use the product, experience the pain points, then write the scope for the next build.
  3. Get the basics done right before moving on to build more advanced features.
  4. Work with the right team.

Fundamentally, I have learnt that if I am  allocating finite resources that have a compounding effect on my company then I am making the right  strategic.

 

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Patent Attorneys and Non-Euclidean Geometry

Now I know why patent attorneys are trained lawyers. A patent isn't so much about invention. Its about owning a territory and arguing that territory should be as large as possible.

Since invention-space is non-Euclidean, there is always some more space to occupy with your invention than is first apparent. Although, this largely depends  on your attorney. Finding this own-able invention-space has been an interesting journey these past few years.

Through working with my attorney, I also learnt that the USPTO also has deadlines and targets making them amenable to negotiation. Its in the USPTO's interests for patent applications to be abandoned or approved, the middle-ground of arguing back and forth is like purgatory for you, and the agent handling your application. Since the USPTO can't force you to abandon an application, they have to negotiate.

On this note, we've been negotiating with the USPTO and are looking to have some good news soon!