Non Disclosure Agreements?

Do they actually protect you?

Also, does anyone know where I can get one online, my friend was meant to get one for me but he is away at the minute. I need one for Friday as I have a meeting to discuss something.

euph

I suppose if you can prove the NDA was signed before a party broke some part of the NDA, and you can prove the party broke that part, then the NDA is effective..

This came up in a quick google search ( i didn't sign an NDA before reading it :pac:)
http://www.dit.ie/media/documents/hothouse/MutualNDA.doc

blue4ever

PM'd

jerryob

IMO, NDA's are very important but only valuable if they can be enforced. The enforcability, in practice, depends on the size of the Parties. My business is just starting off, so while I close NDA's before disclosing sensitive information, I have some rules:
i) Closing a mutual NDA with a large company - a MNC in my case, only works in one direction, i.e. to benefit the MNC.
ii) Having said this, all information disclosed is marked confidential and I keep a paper trail
iii) I refuse to go into the detail of my designs, even with an NDA, until I file my patents. Even then, I don't intend to let my pants down.

In short, it's good business practice to close NDA's, and any potential investors will need such proof. But don't expect the (bigger) companies to treat your Confidential Information to the letter of the Agreement.

NCND's are only effective if you have the money to follow it up should it be broken, a large player could effectively drag it through the courts if they want to costing you an arm and a leg.

The other thing about them is, if you just get a generic one online or whatever, theres going to be lots of ambiguous stuff in there, it needs to be tailored to what you are doing. What you could do is get a generic one and add to it the clauses that are pertinent to your situation

amen

I refuse to go into the detail of my designs, even with an NDA, until I file my patents

I am a bit confused about this part. My understanding of the patent was that it must include the design as this is what you are in effect patetening?

jerryob

Sorry amen, I had a little brain fart there.

Yes, of course all the design details will be disclosed in my patent application. What I mean is that I don't plan to disclose any design details, even under NDA, to MNC's or any other customers/suppliers for that matter. I may have to disclose such detail to potential investors, but not without having a patent priority date.

It comes down to the value of patent applications to startups - only valuable, if defensible. So I'm not intending to drop my pants until 18months after the PCT filing, when it will be published anyway (let's hope I get that far)