Keith Van Sickle ⋅ Menlo Park, CA Tensilica ⋅ 25 years experience

There is a big difference between showing your product idea to a company or an investor.

Having worked for a venture capital firm and having raised money from them, I can tell you that you will not get far trying to have VCs sign an NDA. And they are not in the business of stealing intellectual property. If they did that word would get out and entrepreneurs would no longer seek investments from them. VCs are interested in making winning investments and there is not a high risk of your ideas being stolen.

Companies are different, especially those with products similar to the one you have in mind. In this case, more caution is advised. An NDA is appropriate, as is prudence in your discussions.

Lawrence Cruz ⋅ Stamford, CT Chief Patent Counsel - Conair Corporation ⋅ 22 years experience

Best: File a patent application before showing your idea to someone.

Show only what is necessary to determine the other party's interest. If and when they express interest, ask them to sign a Confidentiality Agreement (sometimes called a Non-disclosure Agreement). Do NOT websurf for the Agreement and wing it because there is no one size fits all. Instead, pay an experienced registered patent lawyer to write one specific to your situation. If he/she is honest it will take less than half hour. The wording matters.

Jo Prabhu ⋅ San Rafael, CA International Services Group ⋅ 20 years experience

i have been through the investor route and they don't sign non-competes or non disclosures. They are not in the business to compete with you but to invest in your product. The ones you have to worry about are your competitors. Hope this helps.

Christopher Ahlberg ⋅ Holtsville, NY Recorded Future, Inc. ⋅ 15 years experience

I would try to avoid protecting via legalese... it usually doesn't work. Just focus on building a great product with some depth and uniqueness to it. If somebody might steal it... just stay away from them to start with.

Doug Williams ⋅ Dundee, IL Schneider Electric ⋅ 20 years experience

This can very difficult - A lot of companies welcome "free" suggestions, but are very reluctant to engage with individuals that don't have a new product, aren't a company, and might not have any patent protection on a product idea.

If you have a patent, or even have filed for a patent - life is easier- no need for either side to be concerned about anybody trying to take ownership.

If nothing is patented and its still an idea, life is much more difficult. It's extremely difficult to try and get in front of a company or investor with just an idea. A lot of companies have specific rules for not engaging with people with unsolicited ideas.

For example, say you went to a company with an idea for a new product that had features ABCD. The person at the company didn't like product ABCD as a whole, in fact it reminded him of a new product idea the company explored last year that had similar features ABC, but failed. A few weeks later, this person at the company thought "Gee, what if we came up with a product that had features "ABD" and added a new feature "E" , and the company made the product with ABDE features. Who owns what?

If you do have an just an idea and still want to pursue - a two stage approach is probably best

1) develop an executive summary that gives the key benefits, potential ROI, and provides a general enough overview of the solution to at least get a conversation started without sacrificing the "secret"sauce of the innovation

2) if the company is interested, then prior to an in-depth discussion, execute an NDA (Non-Disclosure Agreement), You can probably find generic one on line. the NDA will spell out the confidentiality and relationship you propose with the company and how you both will treat new ideas and sensitive information.

I wish you luck.. In most cases the best route if someone has a home-run product idea, then they do their own background market research, invest in a prototype, and then get a patent application filed (best is a utility patent that covers the general idea of the solution and not just the specific product being developed ). After this, then they try and market it to companies...

Good Luck!

Shannon Bradford ⋅ Lakewood, OH RichWorkZone ⋅ 25 years experience

Hi Steven,

You can ask people to sign a Non-Disclosure Agreement (NDA) prior to presenting your proposal. Most people will not have any problem with signing one. If you google it, I am sure you can find an example online.

Good luck with your proposal.

Regards
Shannon