Unified Patents, which was founded three years ago to provide companies with a systematic way to deter nonpracticing entities from asserting weak patents, is adding technologies used in the automotive industry to its existing areas of focus.

The group already seeks to protect technology related to cloud storage, content delivery, and wireless and electronic payments. The new “automotive zone,” as it is called, will be Unified Patents' fifth technological area or zone.

The addition demonstrates the degree to which the automotive sector, which increasingly relies on new technologies such as GPS and integration with mobile devices, has become vulnerable to litigation. In 2014, an estimated 88 percent of all litigation in the automobile industry was driven by nonpracticing entities, and in 2013 it was 94 percent, according to Unified Patents. This was a considerable increase from 2012, when it was 86 percent.