Ale Maiano, cofounder of Wilbe.

Opinion

November 5, 2025

The cult of IP is distracting Europe’s spinout founders

When you start with the market, the mission and the team, the rest, including the right IP, will follow

Ale Maiano

3 min read

In the world of science ventures, patents are often treated like golden tickets. Founders rush to file them, investors demand them as a prerequisite and universities build bureaucracies around them. But this obsession with IP holds back creativity, entrepreneurship and, ultimately, real-world impact.

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Ale Maiano

Ale Maiano is the cofounder and CEO of Wilbe, a pre-seed investor backing scientist founders.

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