Mumbai, April 5 -- Even as the battle for control over Mindtree draws to its inevitable conclusion, attention has been drawn to the options available to vulnerable founders for warding off hostile threats to their ownership of the companies they started. The framing of the discussion around the Bengaluru-based information technology (IT) services company is, of course, slightly flawed. In the first place, Larsen & Toubro (L&T), which has been cast in the role of avaricious acquirer, bought the first tranche of shares in a free and consenting transaction with V. G. Siddhartha. Nor can the engineering major be seen as a typical predator in the mould of the fictional Gordon Gecko, or the more real Carl Icahn (whose repeated, but unsuccessful e...