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>instead they need to have a trove of own patents as defense against patent trolls

but the whole point of patent trolling is that you're suing via a non-practicing entity, which a shell company that does nothing but hold patents, so there's nothing to sue back at.

Most likely it doesn't help against trolls but strengthens their position in cross-licensing negotiations with other companies. When a company's portfolio includes many thousands of patents, due diligence to discover the important ones becomes impossible and it's then a numbers game.

Except if they go out of business at some point, and all those patents end up in the hands of trolls.

I don't see Intel going out of business any time soon...

Much likely they would get acquired by another BigCo specifically for patents, trademarks, etc.