Symantec 2006 Annual Report Download - page 21

Intellectual Property
Protective Measures
We regard some of the features of our internal operations, software, and documentation as proprietary
and rely on copyright, patent, trademark and trade secret laws, confidentiality procedures, contractual
arrangements, and other measures to protect our proprietary information. Our intellectual property is an
important and valuable asset that enables us to gain recognition for our products, services, and technology and
enhance our competitive position.
As part of our confidentiality procedures, we generally enter into non-disclosure agreements with our
employees, distributors, and corporate partners and we enter into license agreements with respect to our
software, documentation, and other proprietary information. These license agreements are generally non-
transferable and have a perpetual term. We also educate our employees on trade secret protection and employ
measures to protect our facilities, equipment, and networks.
Trademarks, Patents, Copyrights, and Licenses
Symantec and the Symantec logo are trademarks or registered trademarks in the U.S. and other
countries. In addition to Symantec and the Symantec logo, we have used, registered, and/or applied to register
other specific trademarks and service marks to help distinguish our products, technologies, and services from
those of our competitors in the U.S. and foreign countries and jurisdictions. We enforce our trademark, service
mark, and trade name rights in the U.S. and abroad. The duration of our trademark registrations varies from
country to country, and in the U.S., we generally are able to maintain our trademark rights and renew any
trademark registrations for as long as the trademarks are in use.
We have a number of U.S. and foreign issued patents and pending patent applications, including patents
and rights to patent applications acquired through strategic transactions, which relate to various aspects of our
products and technology. The duration of our patents is determined by the laws of the country of issuance and
for the U.S. is typically 17 years from the date of issuance of the patent or 20 years from the date of filing of
the patent application resulting in the patent, which we believe is adequate relative to the expected lives of our
products.
Our products are protected under U.S. and international copyright laws and laws related to the protection
of intellectual property and proprietary information. We take measures to label such products with the
appropriate proprietary rights notices and we actively enforce such rights in the U.S. and abroad. However,
these measures may not provide sufficient protection, and our intellectual property rights may be challenged.
In addition, we license some intellectual property from third parties for use in our products, and generally must
rely on the third party to protect the licensed intellectual property rights. While we believe that our ability to
maintain and protect our intellectual property rights is important to our success, we also believe that our
business as a whole is not materially dependent on any particular patent, trademark, license, or other
intellectual property right.
Seasonality
As is typical for many large software companies, a part of our business is seasonal. Software license orders
are generally higher in our third and fourth fiscal quarters and lower in our first and second fiscal quarters. A
significant decline in license orders is typical in the first quarter of our fiscal year when compared to license
orders in the fourth quarter of the prior fiscal year. In addition, we generally receive a higher volume of
software license orders in the last month of a quarter, with orders concentrated in the later part of that month.
We believe that this seasonality primarily reflects customer spending patterns and budget cycles, as well as the
impact of compensation incentive plans for our sales personnel. Software license revenue generally reflects
similar seasonal patterns but to a lesser extent than license orders because license revenue is not recognized
until an order is shipped and other revenue recognition criteria are met.
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