Law360, New York ( September 4, 2014, 1:22 PM EDT) -- A primary threat to a company's freedom to develop and commercialize improvements to its core technology can arise from a variety of corporate transactions. For example, a strategic alliance to cooperate in the marketing of complementary offerings can reveal the inner workings of a company's technology to a current partner but future competitor. As another example, calling on the expertise of an original equipment manufacturer to help develop a specific feature of a future product often requires unveiling critical proprietary information to support the effort. Likewise, through an agreement allowing use of installed software or software as a service (SaaS), a company can provide to a customer intimate knowledge about its offerings. In such transactions, access to and focus on the company's technology can engender creation of improvements, whether planned or unplanned....