Starting a Business and Conflict of Interest

[undertheradar]

My question involves business law in the state of: OH

Hello everyone, thanks for reading this. I hope I don't take up to much of everyone's time. Here is the short version of my story:

I have worked for 2.5 years at a software company that targets a specific market niche. During my time here, I have written many software applications that are of commercial value (and I really mean it) and the company makes use of them internally but has not interest in selling the software. I would like to see my creation(s) go to market, but I understand that I wrote the software on (mostly) company time and therefore, the company owns the work.

My issue: On my spare time, I wrote a peice of software (which I and some associates believe is of higher commercial value than my companies flagship product) that does not directly compete with my workplace, but could. I would like to venture forward with this project (possibly with the help of our owners) but I want to protect my idea.

Referencing my handbook, I do not see anything explicitly stated that they own my work. I do however have to inform them shortly due to a conflict of interest clause in the handbook.

Is there anyway that my workplace can claim ownership of my work. Remember, I did not work on this during work hours and I did not use/steal/borrow any computer code from my workplace.

Thank you everyone for reading this and I appreciate your answers.

[Mr. Knowitall]

If you're serious about this, you need to discuss your plan with a business or intellectual property lawyer. If they sense that you wrote your new product on company time, or used their intellectual property as a basis for your new product, I would expect them to have their lawyers come after you.