Protecting your startup’s negative trade secrets

Understanding Whistleblower Immunity Under the Defend Trade Secrets Act (DTSA)
Last Updated: December 9, 2025
Updated by: Tangibly

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Great piece by Eugene Mar and Tom Pardini. Love seeing negative know-how get the spotlight in TechCrunch!!

I like to think of negative know-how as the expense incurred to find the right solution. The deeper the tech, the higher the cost and value. If you spend millions on a project that fails but leads to the insight that makes the next project successful, you don’t want that info leaving the company. It needs to be treated as a trade secret.

We have a video on negative know-how here:Join the discussion on LinkedIn.

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