You’re three weeks out from a product demo at a conference. The deck is almost done. Nobody on the team has asked whether showing the software first could affect your ability to patent it later.
That question usually doesn’t come up until after the demo, the public code repository, or the beta launch. By then, it’s a different conversation.
The Order of Events Can Matter More Than the Product
Most founders think about patent protection as a question of what they built. Is it novel enough? Is it worth the cost? Those questions matter, but there is an earlier question that often gets skipped: when did people outside the company first see it, and what exactly did they see?
Under United States patent law, prior art can include material that was patented, described in a printed publication, in public use, on sale, or otherwise available to the public before the claimed invention’s effective filing date. The law contains limited exceptions for certain inventor-originated disclosures made one year or less before that date, but those exceptions are not a reason to treat the filing date casually. 35 USCS § 102.
Public disclosure can therefore affect what you are later able to protect. The result depends on what was revealed, who received it, whether confidentiality restrictions applied, and where protection may be sought. This is not a reason to panic before every demonstration. It is a reason to ask the question before the demonstration instead of after.
Please note that a disclosure that may fall within a limited United States exception can still create problems in another country. If international protection may matter, the safest time to assess filing strategy is before any nonconfidential disclosure.
I spent years drafting patent applications for mechanical and electromechanical inventions before most of my practice shifted toward business counsel. The discipline is similar whether the invention is a packaging machine or a piece of software: identify precisely what the inventors built, what problem it addresses, and what distinguishes it from what came before. That analysis is most useful before the invention becomes public, not as a reaction to a disclosure that has already occurred.
Moments When Your Software Becomes Visible
Software companies tend to encounter the same kinds of moments when an invention moves from private development toward outside visibility. Each is worth a pause.
A conference demonstration may reveal more than the finished interface. Depending on its detail, the demonstration may expose the system’s operation, architecture, or underlying technical method to competitors, potential investors, and others in the audience.
A public code repository can reveal the technical approach behind a system even when the company releases only one module. The patent question is not limited to how much code was posted. It includes what a technically informed reader could learn from the code and accompanying documentation.
An investor meeting may feel private, but that does not necessarily make every presentation legally confidential. The practical and legal effect can depend on who received the deck, what confidentiality expectations or agreements existed, and how freely the information could be shared.
A beta release to people outside the company presents similar questions. Confidentiality restrictions may be important, but the analysis also depends on how access was structured, what users could observe, and whether the use was genuinely confidential.
None of these moments is inherently a problem. Each is simply a point by which the company should have considered whether it has something worth protecting and whether a filing or another protection strategy should be in motion.
What to Ask Before Going Forward
The opening question should not be only, Is my software patentable? That question is too broad to be useful at the outset.
A better starting point is: What did we actually build that may be new, what features reveal how it works, and have we made a deliberate decision about protection before sharing those features outside the company?
If the answer is, We haven’t talked about it, that is a signal to pause and evaluate—not necessarily to cancel the demonstration, repository update, or investor meeting. Sometimes proceeding as planned is the right business decision. Sometimes a short review identifies a reason to file first or disclose less.
Whether a particular event creates risk depends on what was built, what will be revealed, who will receive the information, and where the company may seek protection. Treating every disclosure the same can cause a company either to overreact or to lose options it did not realize it had.
A Measured Next Step
If you have a demonstration, repository update, beta release, or investor meeting on the calendar in the next 60 days, that is the time to ask the question. You do not necessarily need a patent application before every outside interaction. You do need to understand whether the timing and content of that interaction matter for your company.
If you are not sure, that uncertainty is worth a short conversation with someone who can evaluate the particular invention and planned disclosure.
The Garcia-Zamor Law Firm serves as general counsel and fractional general counsel for businesses and innovators, helping protect both business operations and intellectual property. Ruy Garcia-Zamor is the firm’s founder, a registered patent attorney with the United States Patent and Trademark Office, and has more than 25 years of experience involving patents, trademarks, intellectual property, and business strategy. Elliott Alderman has more than 40 years of intellectual-property experience and advises businesses. Claudia Castillo focuses on employment issues, and Amulya Annasamudram is a registered patent attorney who focuses on patents and intellectual property. Contact the firm through its website or at (410) 531-9853.
