Universities and Patents
South African universities are increasingly being targeted by intellectual property law firms. Companies like DM Kisch are actively marketing their services by encouraging our academic institutions to convert knowledge and technology in their custody into “intellectual property”.
There are those who argue that the “intellectual property” in the custody of public universities belong to the public and others who argue that “intellectual property” belongs to the university’s funders. There is a clear conflict of interest as public universities comes to term with the international implications of the Bayh-Dole Act.
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Current Patent System is Misguided and Hinders U.S. Competitiveness, Argues New Council Special Report
“Reforms of the U.S. patent system have made it too easy to obtain and defend patents and more costly to challenge patent decisions, thereby limiting the competition of ideas, discouraging innovation, and ultimately reducing U.S. competitiveness, argues a new Council Special Report.”
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Is the future of computing to be controlled by lawyers?
“The greatest differentiator between OS vendors is no longer a question of features, function, performance, customer support, security, reliability or any feature of the product itself. The future of computing may depend on the lawyers.”
