Trade secrets vs patents for grant-funded deep tech: when keeping quiet is the smarter strategy

There's an assumption baked into most grant applications that patents are the key rights for "IP protection". Assessors ask about your IP strategy, and founders often reflexively answer with their patent filing plan. But for all types of tech — but particularly in AI/ML, process chemistry, manufacturing methods and data-driven products — patents may not be your best option, or may not be an option at all. And pursuing them because a grant application seems to expect it can actually weaken your competitive position.

1. Patents require public disclosure

That's the deal. You get 20 (with some extensions available!) years of exclusive rights in exchange for teaching the world exactly how your invention works. For a breakthrough medical device or a novel chemical compound, this tradeoff makes sense — the product is visible, reverse engineering is possible, and a lot of information might have to be disclosed as part of various regulatory pathways. You are not losing anything by filing a patent. But for an algorithm, a manufacturing process, or a data pipeline, the disclosure cost can be far higher than originally anticipated, if a patent is even available at all. Once your patent application publishes (up to 18 months after you file it), your competitors can potentially design around it or may choose to simply go ahead and use your innovation on the basis that they believe detection and enforcement against them may be difficult. On the other hand, many large and sophisticated companies, such as in big pharma, do file patents on seemingly minor process improvements, partly because it can have a deterrent effect on other large companies who actively try and avoid infringing rights.

Although this is not particularly the best reason to file a patent application — because patent applications only publish after 18 months, it is possible to file an application and get a filing date, hopefully helping to secure a grant, and then withdraw the application before publication, if that approach becomes sensible.

2. Trade secrets protect for as long as the secret holds

Potentially forever. Coca-Cola's formula. Google's ranking algorithm. These are commercially valuable specifically because they're not disclosed. For deep tech where the competitive advantage can lie in know-how rather than a patentable product, trade secret protection can be more durable and more commercially rational than a patent. The catch: you have no exclusionary right. If a competitor independently develops the same method, you have no claim against them. The only right you can exert is against someone who misuses the trade secrets they have been provided with in respect of your technology (ideally under a suitably secure NDA!).

3. Grant funders expect dissemination — and this creates tension

Grant funders expect dissemination — and this creates a genuine tension with trade secret strategies. UKRI grants typically require open access publication of research findings. Horizon Europe has explicit dissemination obligations. If your IP strategy relies on secrecy, you need to navigate this carefully. The good news: dissemination requirements generally apply to research findings and methodologies, not to the commercial implementation of those findings. You can therefore potentially publish the findings of the project while keeping the methodology secret. But this boundary needs to be managed deliberately, not assumed. It is often possible, and advisable, to have both patents and trade secrets as part of your IP strategy so you may be able to file a patent application directed towards one element, whilst keeping other elements of your technology secret.

4. The EIC Accelerator's 2026 relaxation helps trade-secret companies

The EIC Accelerator's 2026 relaxation on formal IP disclosure actually helps trade-secret-oriented companies. The Work Programme acknowledges that formal IP filing isn't relevant in every sector, particularly digital. If your IP strategy is trade-secret-based, you can now present this as a deliberate strategic choice in your application rather than an absence of IP protection. Frame it as: "Our competitive advantage resides in proprietary know-how protected through [specific measures], which is more commercially defensible in our sector than patent filing."

5. If you choose the trade secret route, you need documented protection measures

A trade secret is only legally protected if it fulfils several criteria: a) the information is secret; b) it has value because it is kept secret; and c) you've taken reasonable steps to keep it secret. These reasonable steps should be additional measures beyond those you take to protect "normal confidential information". This can include (but will be highly fact specific, so you should seek advice): documented confidentiality and trade secret policies, specific and justified limited access controls (who in your company can access the secret and why — does Joe in accounts really need to know the temperature at which you run your process?), NDAs containing specific trade secret protection and provisions with every person who encounters it, and a register of what constitutes your trade secrets (but certainly not setting out what the secret itself is!). Without these measures, you most likely don't have a trade secret — you just have information which may be confidential (which is subject to different standards), or perhaps simply is unprotected information which has not been disclosed. And the latter is not protectable.

A layered strategy

The decision between patents and trade secrets isn't binary, and it isn't necessarily permanent. Many companies use a layered strategy: patent the product-level inventions that are publicly accessible, protect the process-level know-how as trade secrets, or keep some information as a trade secret for years before then changing strategy and trying to protect it with a patent. The key is making this a deliberate strategic choice rather than a default, and ensuring your grant application and IP strategy reflects that you've thought it through.