Open Invention Network (OIN) is teaming up with IBM, the Linux Foundation and Microsoft to further protect open source software (OSS) from Patent Assertion Entities (PAEs) leveraging low quality patents, also called patent trolls.

The group will support Unified Patents’ Open Source Zone with a substantial annual subscription. This expands OIN’s and its partners’ patent non-aggression activities by deterring PAEs from targeting Linux and adjacent OSS technologies relied on by developers, distributors and users.

Jim Zemlin, Executive Director at the Linux Foundation, quipped: “We see significant value in partnering with OIN, IBM and Microsoft to support Unified Patent’s new Open Source Zone, deterring the activities of patent trolls working against the communities we all depend on.”

OIN’s community practices patent non-aggression in core Linux and adjacent open source technologies by cross-licensing Linux System patents to one another on a royalty-free basis.

Patents owned by OIN are similarly licensed royalty-free to any organization that agrees not to assert its patents against the Linux System. The OIN license can be signed online here.