Patent Trolls and Patent-Busters

In recent times, there have been concerns that the patent system been abused by opportunistic companies known by the phrase "patent trolls". It has been alleged that such entities have stunted innovation and spurred unnecessary patent litigation. There have been particular fears about the rise of "patent trolls" in the field of information technology. Peter Dekin, an assistant general counsel at Intel, first popularised the phrase "patent troll" to describe firms, which acquired patents only to extract settlements from companies on dubious infringement claims:"A patent troll is somebody who tries to make a lot of money off a patent that they are not practising and have no intention of practising and in most cases never practised."