A US citizen claims to have patent rights on key software for betting exchanges. It is mounting a legal campaign against Betfair and other exchange betting companies for the unauthorised use of this patented software.

Lawrence Kohls of Chicago was awarded a U.S. patent on the "brokerless futures exchange" process, and was awarded a similar patent in Australia since 2001. According to Kohls, he brought his invention to the UK in 1998, where it has been copied by various betting exchanges.

He now claims royalties for the use of his invention of these companies, both in the UK and Australia.