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Why would you need to go to these lengths (waiting 2 years and competing in a different geogrpahical region)? What have you done wrong by making a competitor to your previous companies product? I ask this because I am thinking of doing something similar due to the fact that my employer is extremely incompetent. I am the only developer of a project that I helped take from no revenue to hundreds of thousands of dollars revenue but that should be making millions of dollars revenue. Unfortunately, I am micro-managed and often just have to implement the ridiculous ideas of my boss.

If I made a competitor, it would obviously share some of the same ideas as the current project. I mean, every social network has an "add friend" function, for example. Some things are just the right way to do things, or inherently part of the business domain.

If they started patenting all of my ideas, I would expect to actually be paid a decent salary.

[annnnd]

<IANAL> It depends mostly on non-competing clause in your contract with them. Unless you steal their code (even if you wrote it, it's theirs!) I don't think they can sue you for using "their" ideas. </IANAL>