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  "data": {
    "topic": "invention-assignment",
    "state": "washington",
    "frontmatter": {
      "title": "Employee Invention Assignment in Washington",
      "description": "Washington's RCW 49.44.140 voids any clause forcing an employee to assign an invention developed entirely on their own time, without the employer's resources, that is unrelated to the employer's business and does not result from the employee's work; the employer must give written notice of that carve-out at signing. Whether a post-employment holdover clause is enforceable is unsettled in Washington.",
      "state": "Washington",
      "lastReviewed": "2026-06-30",
      "license": "CC BY 4.0",
      "authors": [
        "steven-obiajulu"
      ],
      "summary": {
        "bottomLine": "A Washington employer may require assignment of inventions tied to its business or to the employee's work, but RCW 49.44.140 voids forced assignment of true own-time, own-resource inventions and requires written notice of that carve-out at signing; whether a post-employment holdover clause is enforceable is unsettled in Washington.",
        "keyLaw": "RCW 49.44.140–.150; Waterjet Tech., Inc. v. Flow Int'l Corp., 140 Wn.2d 313 (2000)",
        "statutoryCarveOut": "statute",
        "defaultOwnership": "employee",
        "employeeNoticeRequired": "yes",
        "holdoverClauseLimit": "unsettled",
        "carveOutScope": "An invention the employee developed entirely on their own time, without the employer's equipment, supplies, facilities, or trade secret information, that neither relates to the employer's business or anticipated research and development nor results from the employee's work"
      },
      "about": [
        "RCW 49.44.140 invention assignment",
        "Washington own-time invention carve-out",
        "RCW 49.44.140(3) written notice requirement",
        "Waterjet Technology v. Flow International",
        "Washington holdover trailing assignment clause",
        "Stanford v. Roche default invention ownership"
      ],
      "translations": [
        {
          "language": "中文",
          "status": "planned"
        },
        {
          "language": "Español",
          "status": "planned"
        },
        {
          "language": "Português",
          "status": "planned"
        },
        {
          "language": "Deutsch",
          "status": "planned"
        }
      ],
      "relatedForm": {
        "slug": "openagreements-confidentiality-invention-assignment-agreement"
      }
    },
    "questions": [
      {
        "slug": "statutory-carve-out",
        "label": "Can the employer require assignment of every invention?",
        "heading": "Can a Washington employer require assignment of every invention?",
        "answerText": "No. RCW 49.44.140 carves out a category of inventions that an assignment clause simply cannot reach: anything the employee developed entirely on their own time, without the employer's equipment, supplies, facilities, or trade secret information, that neither relates to the employer's business or anticipated research and development nor results from the employee's work. To the extent a clause purports to capture those own-time inventions, it is against the public policy of the state and void.",
        "sources": [
          {
            "id": "stat-140-carveout",
            "authorityType": "primary-law",
            "tier": "primary-source-backed",
            "title": "RCW 49.44.140",
            "citation": "RCW 49.44.140(1).",
            "url": "https://app.leg.wa.gov/RCW/default.aspx?cite=49.44.140",
            "proposition": "RCW 49.44.140(1) makes an assignment clause inapplicable to an invention the employee developed entirely on their own time without the employer's equipment, supplies, facilities, or trade secret information, unless the invention relates directly to the employer's business or to its actual or demonstrably anticipated research or development, or results from the employee's work.",
            "verbatimQuote": "A provision in an employment agreement which provides that an employee shall assign or offer to assign any of the employee's rights in an invention to the employer does not apply to an invention for which no equipment, supplies, facilities, or trade secret information of the employer was used and which was developed entirely on the employee's own time, unless (a) the invention relates (i) directly to the business of the employer, or (ii) to the employer's actual or demonstrably anticipated research or development, or (b) the invention results from any work performed by the employee for the employer.",
            "anchor": "https://openagreements.org/practice-guides/invention-assignment/us/washington#src-stat-140-carveout"
          },
          {
            "id": "stat-140-void",
            "authorityType": "primary-law",
            "tier": "primary-source-backed",
            "title": "RCW 49.44.140",
            "citation": "RCW 49.44.140(1).",
            "url": "https://app.leg.wa.gov/RCW/default.aspx?cite=49.44.140",
            "proposition": "RCW 49.44.140(1) declares that any provision purporting to apply to an own-time, own-resource invention outside the statute's exceptions is to that extent against the public policy of the state and void and unenforceable.",
            "verbatimQuote": "Any provision which purports to apply to such an invention is to that extent against the public policy of this state and is to that extent void and unenforceable.",
            "anchor": "https://openagreements.org/practice-guides/invention-assignment/us/washington#src-stat-140-void"
          },
          {
            "id": "stat-140-condition",
            "authorityType": "primary-law",
            "tier": "primary-source-backed",
            "title": "RCW 49.44.140",
            "citation": "RCW 49.44.140(2).",
            "url": "https://app.leg.wa.gov/RCW/default.aspx?cite=49.44.140",
            "proposition": "RCW 49.44.140(2) bars an employer from requiring a provision made void and unenforceable by subsection (1) as a condition of employment or continuing employment.",
            "verbatimQuote": "An employer shall not require a provision made void and unenforceable by subsection (1) of this section as a condition of employment or continuing employment.",
            "anchor": "https://openagreements.org/practice-guides/invention-assignment/us/washington#src-stat-140-condition"
          }
        ]
      },
      {
        "slug": "employee-notice",
        "label": "Must the employer give the employee written notice of the carve-out?",
        "heading": "Must a Washington employer notify the employee?",
        "answerText": "Yes. RCW 49.44.140(3) requires an employer whose agreement contains an invention-assignment provision to give the employee, at the time the agreement is made, a written notification that the agreement does not apply to a qualifying own-time invention. Washington's leading case glosses this obligation: the notice may appear in the employment agreement itself, subsection (3) is not a vehicle for a facial challenge to an otherwise valid agreement, and if the agreement overreaches the remedy is to strike the offending portions, not void the whole.",
        "sources": [
          {
            "id": "stat-140-notice",
            "authorityType": "primary-law",
            "tier": "primary-source-backed",
            "title": "RCW 49.44.140",
            "citation": "RCW 49.44.140(3).",
            "url": "https://app.leg.wa.gov/RCW/default.aspx?cite=49.44.140",
            "proposition": "RCW 49.44.140(3) requires an employer whose agreement contains an assignment provision to give the employee, at the time the agreement is made, a written notification that the agreement does not apply to a qualifying own-time, own-resource invention.",
            "verbatimQuote": "If an employment agreement entered into after September 1, 1979, contains a provision requiring the employee to assign any of the employee's rights in any invention to the employer, the employer must also, at the time the agreement is made, provide a written notification to the employee that the agreement does not apply to an invention for which no equipment, supplies, facility, or trade secret information of the employer was used and which was developed entirely on the employee's own time",
            "anchor": "https://openagreements.org/practice-guides/invention-assignment/us/washington#src-stat-140-notice"
          },
          {
            "id": "waterjet-notice-in-agreement",
            "authorityType": "case-law",
            "tier": "primary-source-backed",
            "title": "Waterjet Technology, Inc. v. Flow International Corp.",
            "citation": "Waterjet Tech., Inc. v. Flow Int'l Corp., 140 Wn.2d 313 (2000).",
            "url": "https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/4907586/waterjet-technology-inc-v-flow-international-corp/",
            "deepLink": "https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/4907586/waterjet-technology-inc-v-flow-international-corp/#:~:text=there%20is%20no%20reason%20why,in%20the%20employment%20agreement%20itself.",
            "proposition": "Waterjet holds that the written notification required by RCW 49.44.140(3) may be provided within the employment agreement itself; the statute requires only that the employer provide a written notification.",
            "verbatimQuote": "there is no reason why notice may not be provided in the employment agreement itself.",
            "date": "2000-04-06",
            "anchor": "https://openagreements.org/practice-guides/invention-assignment/us/washington#src-waterjet-notice-in-agreement"
          },
          {
            "id": "waterjet-not-facial",
            "authorityType": "case-law",
            "tier": "primary-source-backed",
            "title": "Waterjet Technology, Inc. v. Flow International Corp.",
            "citation": "Waterjet Tech., Inc. v. Flow Int'l Corp., 140 Wn.2d 313 (2000).",
            "url": "https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/4907586/waterjet-technology-inc-v-flow-international-corp/",
            "deepLink": "https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/4907586/waterjet-technology-inc-v-flow-international-corp/#:~:text=RCW%2049.44.140(3)%20is%20not%20a,agreements%20that%20violate%20public%20policy",
            "proposition": "Waterjet holds that RCW 49.44.140(3) is not a vehicle for a facial challenge to an otherwise valid employment agreement; its purpose is to prevent enforcement of overbroad agreements that violate public policy.",
            "verbatimQuote": "RCW 49.44.140(3) is not a vehicle for a facial challenge to an otherwise valid employment agreement; its purpose is to prevent enforcement of overbroad agreements that violate public policy",
            "date": "2000-04-06",
            "anchor": "https://openagreements.org/practice-guides/invention-assignment/us/washington#src-waterjet-not-facial"
          },
          {
            "id": "waterjet-strike",
            "authorityType": "case-law",
            "tier": "primary-source-backed",
            "title": "Waterjet Technology, Inc. v. Flow International Corp.",
            "citation": "Waterjet Tech., Inc. v. Flow Int'l Corp., 140 Wn.2d 313 (2000).",
            "url": "https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/4907586/waterjet-technology-inc-v-flow-international-corp/",
            "deepLink": "https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/4907586/waterjet-technology-inc-v-flow-international-corp/#:~:text=Overreaching%20portions%20of%20the%20agreement,stricken%20as%20against%20public%20policy",
            "proposition": "Waterjet holds that the remedy for an overbroad invention-assignment agreement is to strike the overreaching portions as against public policy, not to void the entire agreement.",
            "verbatimQuote": "Overreaching portions of the agreement should be stricken as against public policy",
            "date": "2000-04-06",
            "anchor": "https://openagreements.org/practice-guides/invention-assignment/us/washington#src-waterjet-strike"
          },
          {
            "id": "stat-150-disclose",
            "authorityType": "primary-law",
            "tier": "primary-source-backed",
            "title": "RCW 49.44.150",
            "citation": "RCW 49.44.150.",
            "url": "https://app.leg.wa.gov/RCW/default.aspx?cite=49.44.150",
            "proposition": "RCW 49.44.150 requires the employee, even after meeting the burden of proving the RCW 49.44.140 carve-out conditions, to disclose all inventions being developed for the purpose of determining employer or employee rights.",
            "verbatimQuote": "Even though the employee meets the burden of proving the conditions specified in RCW 49.44.140 , the employee shall, at the time of employment or thereafter, disclose all inventions being developed by the employee, for the purpose of determining employer or employee rights.",
            "anchor": "https://openagreements.org/practice-guides/invention-assignment/us/washington#src-stat-150-disclose"
          }
        ]
      },
      {
        "slug": "default-ownership",
        "label": "Absent a written assignment, who owns the invention?",
        "heading": "Who owns an invention by default in Washington?",
        "answerText": "The inventor. Absent a written assignment, the baseline rule under federal patent law — which governs who holds title to a patentable invention in Washington as elsewhere — is that rights belong to the employee who conceived it. The U.S. Supreme Court restated that premise in Stanford v. Roche, and although others may acquire an interest, that interest must trace back to the inventor. Washington has not definitively decided whether its common-law overlays give an employer title without a written assignment — Waterjet expressly declined to reach that question — so the federal inventor-owns baseline controls.",
        "sources": [
          {
            "id": "stanford-inventor",
            "authorityType": "case-law",
            "tier": "primary-source-backed",
            "title": "Bd. of Trustees of the Leland Stanford Junior Univ. v. Roche Molecular Systems",
            "citation": "Bd. of Trustees of the Leland Stanford Junior Univ. v. Roche Molecular Sys., Inc., 563 U.S. 776 (2011).",
            "url": "https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/218133/board-of-trustees-of-the-leland-stanford-junior-university-v-roche/",
            "deepLink": "https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/218133/board-of-trustees-of-the-leland-stanford-junior-university-v-roche/#:~:text=Since%201790%2C%20the%20patent%20law,invention%20belong%20to%20the%20inventor.",
            "proposition": "Stanford v. Roche confirms the long-standing premise of U.S. patent law that rights in an invention belong to the inventor.",
            "verbatimQuote": "Since 1790, the patent law has operated on the premise that rights in an invention belong to the inventor.",
            "date": "2011-06-06",
            "anchor": "https://openagreements.org/practice-guides/invention-assignment/us/washington#src-stanford-inventor"
          },
          {
            "id": "stanford-traceback",
            "authorityType": "case-law",
            "tier": "primary-source-backed",
            "title": "Bd. of Trustees of the Leland Stanford Junior Univ. v. Roche Molecular Systems",
            "citation": "Bd. of Trustees of the Leland Stanford Junior Univ. v. Roche Molecular Sys., Inc., 563 U.S. 776 (2011).",
            "url": "https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/218133/board-of-trustees-of-the-leland-stanford-junior-university-v-roche/",
            "deepLink": "https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/218133/board-of-trustees-of-the-leland-stanford-junior-university-v-roche/#:~:text=Thus%2C%20although%20others%20may%20acquire,trace%20back%20to%20the%20inventor.",
            "proposition": "Stanford v. Roche holds that although others may acquire an interest in an invention, that interest as a general rule must trace back to the inventor — so an employer takes title only through an assignment from the employee-inventor.",
            "verbatimQuote": "Thus, although others may acquire an interest in an invention, any such interest — as a general rule — must trace back to the inventor.",
            "date": "2011-06-06",
            "anchor": "https://openagreements.org/practice-guides/invention-assignment/us/washington#src-stanford-traceback"
          },
          {
            "id": "waterjet-declined",
            "authorityType": "case-law",
            "tier": "primary-source-backed",
            "title": "Waterjet Technology, Inc. v. Flow International Corp.",
            "citation": "Waterjet Tech., Inc. v. Flow Int'l Corp., 140 Wn.2d 313 (2000).",
            "url": "https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/4907586/waterjet-technology-inc-v-flow-international-corp/",
            "deepLink": "https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/4907586/waterjet-technology-inc-v-flow-international-corp/#:~:text=we%20decline%20to%20reach%20the%20third%20certified%20question.",
            "proposition": "Waterjet expressly declined to decide whether RCW 49.44.140 preempts an employer's common-law rights to inventions by employees hired or directed to invent, leaving Washington's common-law ownership overlays unsettled.",
            "verbatimQuote": "we decline to reach the third certified question.",
            "date": "2000-04-06",
            "anchor": "https://openagreements.org/practice-guides/invention-assignment/us/washington#src-waterjet-declined"
          }
        ]
      },
      {
        "slug": "holdover-clause-limit",
        "label": "Are post-employment trailing-assignment clauses enforceable?",
        "heading": "Are trailing-assignment (holdover) clauses enforceable in Washington?",
        "answerText": "Unsettled. This is where Washington diverges from California. There is no published Washington authority deciding whether a clause reaching inventions conceived after employment ends is enforceable, and no Washington statute that expressly caps such a clause. Washington's noncompete statute does not fill the gap, because its definition of a noncompetition covenant excludes covenants about inventions. The most a careful reader can say is that an overreaching clause would likely be trimmed under Waterjet's remedy framing — but the core enforceability question remains open.",
        "sources": [
          {
            "id": "waterjet-strike-holdover",
            "authorityType": "case-law",
            "tier": "primary-source-backed",
            "title": "Waterjet Technology, Inc. v. Flow International Corp.",
            "citation": "Waterjet Tech., Inc. v. Flow Int'l Corp., 140 Wn.2d 313 (2000).",
            "url": "https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/4907586/waterjet-technology-inc-v-flow-international-corp/",
            "deepLink": "https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/4907586/waterjet-technology-inc-v-flow-international-corp/#:~:text=Overreaching%20portions%20of%20the%20agreement,stricken%20as%20against%20public%20policy",
            "proposition": "Waterjet holds that the remedy for an overbroad invention-assignment agreement is to strike the overreaching portions as against public policy, suggesting a Washington court would trim rather than enforce an overbroad holdover clause — though no published decision squarely addresses post-employment trailing assignments.",
            "verbatimQuote": "Overreaching portions of the agreement should be stricken as against public policy",
            "date": "2000-04-06",
            "anchor": "https://openagreements.org/practice-guides/invention-assignment/us/washington#src-waterjet-strike-holdover"
          },
          {
            "id": "stat-140-void-holdover",
            "authorityType": "primary-law",
            "tier": "primary-source-backed",
            "title": "RCW 49.44.140",
            "citation": "RCW 49.44.140(1).",
            "url": "https://app.leg.wa.gov/RCW/default.aspx?cite=49.44.140",
            "proposition": "RCW 49.44.140(1) voids any provision purporting to apply to a qualifying own-time invention during employment, but is silent about clauses reaching inventions conceived after employment ends.",
            "verbatimQuote": "Any provision which purports to apply to such an invention is to that extent against the public policy of this state and is to that extent void and unenforceable.",
            "anchor": "https://openagreements.org/practice-guides/invention-assignment/us/washington#src-stat-140-void-holdover"
          },
          {
            "id": "stat-140-notice-practice",
            "authorityType": "primary-law",
            "tier": "primary-source-backed",
            "title": "RCW 49.44.140",
            "citation": "RCW 49.44.140(3).",
            "url": "https://app.leg.wa.gov/RCW/default.aspx?cite=49.44.140",
            "proposition": "RCW 49.44.140(3) requires an employer whose agreement contains an assignment provision to give the employee, at the time the agreement is made, a written notification that the agreement does not apply to a qualifying own-time, own-resource invention.",
            "verbatimQuote": "If an employment agreement entered into after September 1, 1979, contains a provision requiring the employee to assign any of the employee's rights in any invention to the employer, the employer must also, at the time the agreement is made, provide a written notification to the employee that the agreement does not apply to an invention for which no equipment, supplies, facility, or trade secret information of the employer was used and which was developed entirely on the employee's own time",
            "anchor": "https://openagreements.org/practice-guides/invention-assignment/us/washington#src-stat-140-notice-practice"
          },
          {
            "id": "waterjet-strike-practice",
            "authorityType": "case-law",
            "tier": "primary-source-backed",
            "title": "Waterjet Technology, Inc. v. Flow International Corp.",
            "citation": "Waterjet Tech., Inc. v. Flow Int'l Corp., 140 Wn.2d 313 (2000).",
            "url": "https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/4907586/waterjet-technology-inc-v-flow-international-corp/",
            "deepLink": "https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/4907586/waterjet-technology-inc-v-flow-international-corp/#:~:text=Overreaching%20portions%20of%20the%20agreement,stricken%20as%20against%20public%20policy",
            "proposition": "Waterjet holds that the remedy for an overbroad invention-assignment agreement is to strike the overreaching portions as against public policy, not to void the entire agreement.",
            "verbatimQuote": "Overreaching portions of the agreement should be stricken as against public policy",
            "date": "2000-04-06",
            "anchor": "https://openagreements.org/practice-guides/invention-assignment/us/washington#src-waterjet-strike-practice"
          }
        ]
      }
    ]
  }
}