Category: Blog

Protecting Your Custom Software Development

If you are a custom software developer, the best thing you can do to protect your invention is to have in your arsenal a customized software development agreement tailored to your specific business. Developing code is a unique enterprise. Just like you would never borrow someone’s code to develop your software, you should never borrow some other software developers’ contracts or agreements to protect your work. At JGPC Business Law we assist software developers in drafting custom software...

Getting Your LLC Documentation in Order

Written by JGPC Business Law.

Written by JGPC Business Law on July 10, 2019. Updated May 2026. Proper LLC documentation is essential for protecting business owners from personal liability and maintaining the legal protections offered by a limited liability company. Failing to maintain required formation and operational documents can expose LLC members to personal financial risk and create serious legal problems for the business. Two nightmare scenarios can turn a business enterprise from a dream into a horror story...

Asset Protection Attorney – Protect Assets from Creditors

Written by JGPC Business Law.

Everyone who opens a business does so with the intention of making a profit, so why do so many businesses in Fremont, Livermore, and elsewhere end up failing? Even worse, almost any holiday party or barroom bull session will involve someone telling a story of how his long-standing financial woes began with a bad business decision. The fact that businesses sometimes fail to make a profit and have to close is just a normal part of capitalism, but no one’s personal financial situation should...

What Do IP Attorneys Do and When Do You Need One?

Written by JGPC Business Law.

Ideas, creative inventions and processes, and trademarks are what help give you an edge over your competition, and it is your intellectual property (IP) attorney’s job to ensure these assets continue to provide you benefits and advantages for years to come. Your IP attorney’s mission is simple: to help you take advantage of intellectual property laws in the United States and wherever else your business conducts commercial activity so that your products or services are distinguished from...

What Happens in a Legal Mediation Proceeding?

Written by JGPC Business Law.

There are several ways that a California business dispute can be resolved, but litigation is usually not the preferred method for doing so. While many businesses will enter the courtroom in order to protect their rights, litigation may be considered by some businesses only as a last resort when other methods of dispute resolution have failed. Not only is litigation expensive (some businesses will have to pay hundreds or even thousands of dollars to their legal teams before the dispute even...

What is Civil Litigation?

Written by JGPC Business Law.

What is Civil Litigation and When is a Lawyer Needed? Disputes and disagreements are commonplace in the business world, and civil litigation is one method whereby these disputes and disagreements may be resolved. Civil litigation is appropriate in circumstances where arbitration, mediation, and other forms of informal dispute resolution are ineffective. While there is nothing that requires California businesses to retain a lawyer to assist them in navigating the civil litigation process,...

What are the Benefits of Patent Pending Status?

Written by JGPC Business Law.

It is well-known that patents can provide useful protection to a California business’s ideas and inventions. Even if you or another business owner are not completely clear on what specific protections and remedies are available to you as the holder of a patent, you generally know that a patent protects you from competitors or others who attempt to steal your ideas or inventions for their own gain. Less known, however, is whether “patent pending” status holds any benefit to a business owner in...

JGPC Law - Alameda County Business and Corporate Mediation Attorneys

Software Patents and Alice in the Looking Glass

Written by JGPC Business Law.

Author: Gerald R. Prettyman, J.D., LL.M. The public tends to believe the purpose of the Patent Office is to issue patents. The facts paint a different conclusion. Typically, very few patent applications get approved for a patent on first examination. Saying 1 in 10,000 would not be far wrong. Most patent applications achieve allowance (approval for a patent) through the talents of a patent attorney. Overall, the final average of typically above 50%. Then there is software. Until 1981, the...

How to Legally Protect Your Inventions and Ideas

Written by JGPC Business Law.

An idea can be worth a million dollars – to you or to your competitor – which is why it is important to take steps to protect your inventions and ideas. Unfortunately, many California business owners fail to take reasonable and simple measures to prevent competitors from learning about these valuable ideas and inventions. A small business owner can be especially disadvantaged if the competitor not only learns of the idea or invention but takes steps to protect that very same idea or invention...

What to Do Before You Disclose

Written by JGPC Business Law.

Author: Gerald R. Prettyman, J.D., LL.M. A question high on the list of first asked questions to a Patent Attorney, is “what do I need to protect my idea before I talk to an investor, (a manufacturer or licensor), etc. The answer, or answers as a inventor should take multiple steps, are not complicated. The first step is to record the idea in writing. While many inventors are reluctant to putting the idea in writing with the thought that doing so limits them to only what is in writing, not...