IBM may be leading the pack when it comes to putting away patents related to cloud technologies.

In the past 18 months, the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office has issued more 1,200 patents to IBM related to the cloud, with 400 of those issued so far in 2015, according to an IBM tally released Friday.

For IBM, adding to its intellectual property is key to ensuring that the company will be a major player in the cloud market for years to come, said David Kaminsky, chief patent innovation architect for IBM software.

With a fat cloud patent portfolio, IBM is less likely to be blocked from selling the most up-to-date offerings due to a competing company asserting patent claims.

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