The Rolling Provisional Strategy

Patent Protection That Evolves With Your Product

Startups don’t invent something once.

They ship an MVP.
They re-architect.
They optimize.
They replace components.
They discover better implementations.

Traditional patent strategy assumes a fully formed invention on Day One. Most startups don’t work that way.

The rolling provisional strategy fixes that mismatch.

The Core Concept

You file an initial provisional patent application when you have a meaningful technical implementation. As your technology evolves over the next twelve months, you file additional provisionals covering material improvements. Before the first one expires, you file a single non-provisional utility application that claims priority to all of them.

Under practice before the United States Patent and Trademark Office, each claim in the non-provisional gets the benefit of the earliest provisional that adequately supports it.

The result: one application, multiple priority dates.

Early features get early dates. Later improvements get later dates. Everything is anchored.

Why It Matters

Your product at Month 0 will not be your product at Month 9.

If you file one provisional and never update it, later technical advances may lack protection — especially if you launch publicly, demo to investors, or publish.

Rolling provisionals solve this by creating a structured timeline of protection:

• Core architecture → locked in early

• Performance improvements → locked in when developed

• Alternative implementations → captured when discovered

Instead of freezing your patent position at the beginning, you build it as you build the company.

What Counts as an “Update”?

You don’t file a new provisional for cosmetic tweaks.

You consider one when there’s a material technical change:

• A new system architecture

• A new algorithm or training method

• A performance breakthrough

• A newly solved technical problem

• A commercially significant technical feature

Provisionals can’t be amended after filing. New substance requires a new filing.

The discipline is simple: when the technology meaningfully evolves, ask whether your patent filings should evolve too.

The 12-Month Convergence

Before the earliest provisional hits its 12-month deadline, you file a single non-provisional application that:

• Consolidates all disclosures

• Adds formal claims

• Claims priority to every provisional filed

Some claims may trace back to the first filing. Others may rely on later ones. That’s normal.

What matters is that each claim is protected as of the earliest date it was properly disclosed.

The Strategic Advantage

Rolling provisionals align patent protection with how startups actually build:

• Iterative

• Versioned

• Forward-moving

Instead of asking, “Is this the final version of our invention?” you ask, “Have we captured this stage of innovation?”

By the time you file your non-provisional, you haven’t just protected an idea.

You’ve protected a year of technical progress — locked in, timestamped, and ready to be examined.