Microsoft Corporation (MSFT) Is Becoming More Business-Friendly On Tech Collaborations

Collaboration among companies is a common occurrence in the world of tech, and Microsoft Corporation (NASDAQ:MSFT) has taken some steps to insure it’s viewed as more business-friendly to deal with. The company has announced a new initiative aimed at reducing some of the concerns of other firms it works on projects with.

CNBC has the details on Microsoft’s plans.

Microsoft is letting firms it works with on joint ventures keep patent and design rights for the technology it collaborates on.
The move, part of the firm’s new initiative on intellectual property (IP), is expected to reduce concerns of tech giants like Microsoft using knowledge of their customers’ market to compete with them.

Brad Smith, Microsoft’s president, explained the tech giant’s reasoning for the initiative in a blog post. “As collaboration like this between tech companies and their customers increases, so will the questions regarding who owns the patents and resulting intellectual property,” he wrote.

Previously, Microsoft allowed partners to commercialize created technologies through licensing agreements, but that opened up some confusion about copyrights. Mark Hung, research vice president at Gartner, notes that Microsoft’s move is “a good first step to allow these innovations to continue to blossom.”

Microsoft Corporation shares fell $0.98 (-1.06%) in premarket trading Friday. Year-to-date, MSFT has gained 7.70%, versus a -0.77% rise in the benchmark S&P 500 index during the same period.

MSFT currently has a StockNews.com POWR Rating of B (Buy), and is ranked #8 of 64 stocks in the Software – Application category.