© gurdonark

The startup community needs to get up and take notice of the Facebook vs. Yahoo patent war. There are deeper implications for Facebook than just the lawsuit. This lawsuit could play a decisive role in investor decisions before the upcoming IPO of the social networking giant.
Startup businesses have to realize the importance of intellectual property. These patents can help the company in many ways in terms of royalties or acquisitions in the future. Startup businesses have to identify the unique technologies that they possess and try to patent them. This will also protect them from litigation in the future.
Now is a good time for startup businesses to bring about a change in their strategies since the US patent system is changing and some provisions of the America Invents Act will go into effect as early as March 2013. The companies have to first ascertain their target consumer base: global or American. The US system allows the inventors to file for a patent even after one year of public disclosure so the legal technicalities can be avoided by filing for a patent before sale or public use. Startup businesses can also identify their unique technology and file provisional patents before going into a full patent. This gives some grace period to the company and also prevents someone else from patenting that technology. The fees for filing a provisional patent are around $125 and will go a long way in safeguarding the interests of the company.

© mia.judkins

Australian Chamber of Commerce and Industry has revealed that the small business sector is trailing behind in the economy, and it has made changes in imbalanced laws of dismissal.
A Survey conducted by ACCI on 1,744 small business sectors has shown that the situation of these business sectors has evened out. ACCI further opined that, the trading conditions have been repressed due to the improbability arising from the European sovereign debt crisis and torpid domestic demand.
The small business sector is losing its position in the economy, as even the large businesses are not expecting much in potential financial year, reveal the results.
Greg Evans, the director of economics in ACCI, was of the opinion that the operators of small business sector have revealed that they are experiencing tremendously tough trading conditions, and aren't much positive about the coming years. He further added that "The present economic scenario is creating uncertainty about the course of interest rates, and weak demand situations in most of the sectors."
ACCI has demanded for changes in the biased dismissal laws which are one of its many proposals. The Victorian Government has been in the favor of ACCI's concerns about payments made to the employees who are dismissed.

© topgold

A workshop about having the right brain business plan is going to be conducted at Ocean Resort near Campbell River on 25th and 26th of February.
This workshop is about the book Right Brain Business Plan and it has been written to provide benefits to people who find conventional business planning unproductive and they don't tend to write a business plan for themselves even if they need one for better future prospects.

Although this workshop will have the material, which a conventional business plan needs, it will be presented in a more creative, visual and appealing manner. According to the authorities, it will involve one's right brain and occupy the left-brain too.
The first day at the workshop will give insights about the process of coming up with the right business plan by the end of the day. The second day will take the participants in more depth of their respective plans. All the participants of the workshop will be given a free copy of the best-selling book written by Jennifer Lee named 'The Right-Brain Business Plan: A Creative, Visual Map for Success' as part of future guidance. The participants will also be facilitated by licensed facilitator named Annie Rousseau of Circle Tree Studios.