Lycos, one of the early pioneers of search engines, recently announced that it is selling its “large portfolio of innovative-patented technologies ranging from search engine technology to on-line advertising and online gaming.”

In announcing the sale, Lycos became the latest example of what some have dubbed “zombie companies”: companies that appear to be dead in the marketplace but nevertheless survive for one last breath by selling their patent portfolios. These patents will have one of two fates: They will either be sold to an entity intent on utilizing them as offensive weapons to extract licensing fees or litigation victories against alleged infringers, or bought for defensive purposes as a potential “mutually assured destruction” deterrent or to pre-emptively remove them from potential adversaries' arsenals.

The Dawn of the Dead

Turn on your television in the early part of this decade and you were bound to see a zombie. Around this same time, many of the world's biggest technology companies were engaged in battle. Dubbed the “smartphone wars,” Apple's iPhone was pitted against Google's legion of Android devices, with Microsoft, Samsung and many others playing starring roles in litigation and licensing deals. Instead of armies of flesh-eating zombies, this war's weapons of choice were patents, and rather than a last stand at a deserted shopping mall, battles were playing out in courtrooms and boardrooms across America.