Patent trolls beware. State attorneys general from around the country have donned their armor and picked up their swords, ready to slay the beasts that they claim threaten our economy.
At the heart of the issue is the term “patent troll” itself. There are those who see it as unnecessarily pejorative, and prefer other, more neutral terms. Among the alternatives are non-practicing entities (NPE) or patent-assertion entities (PAE). But no matter what name you give these companies, critics contend that they exist merely to snatch up a portfolio of patents to use as ammunition for lawsuits, rather than innovate or create anything new.
