Microsoft is continuing its quest for attracting small businesses. In more attempts to entice the small business community, the Redmond software giant is now expanding a program under which technologies it has developed in its research labs are either licensed to startup companies or offered in exchange for profit sharing or an ownership stake. It said Tuesday that it plans to sell its non-core technology to start-up companies. The probable reason for doing this is to give these technologies a chance rather than kick them to the backburner and let them sit patiently.

David Harnett, senior director of IP (Intellectual Property) Ventures says that Microsoft is offering 35 technologies as part of IP Ventures. This is a program that was started by Microsoft in May of 2005. "We provided three Irish companies with source code to test and subsequently licensed it to one, Softedge Systems. Since then we've taken another three technologies to Enterprise Ireland and expect at least another two deals before July," said Harnett

Brad Smith, a senior vice president and Microsoft's chief lawyer, will go into more details about the program during the Government Leaders Forum in Lisbon. The two day Microsoft sponsored event should be an appropriate introduction since government leaders from around Europe will be attending.

The typical Microsoft research and development budget is around $1.5 billion per quarter. This may seem like a large amount, but the irony of it is that Microsoft figures other companies tend to get more use and find the research more interesting than they do themselves.

Microsoft added that not all of its technology will be sold exclusively to start-up companies. Some of it will also be licensed to them. Overall, this is a creative method for Microsoft to get some of what it knows out to the public. Even if they still hold the rights to the technology, one might never know what bright ideas can be created outside of Microsoft. The whole concept isn't a new idea, but now we might see what someone else could do with the R&D.