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Originally Posted by Jomz Well, this is how the research community gets funds. |
The research community, whatever that may be, gets their funds from various sources. A few weeks ago I spend a week at Stanford University. I wrote about that visit here:
http://www.team-bhp.com/forum/intern...omous-car.html
We actually discussed the funding of this particular project and others in some detail. A lot of the research done at Stanford is funded from the the private sector. In general Stanford hands over the research result lock stock and barrel to who ever paid for it. Of course, they also publish their results in the public domain as a lot of the research is done by graduate students.
Last year I had the pleasure of staying for a week at the Santa Fe Science institute. A lot of their research is funded by the private sector and they have an elaborate (private and public) fund raising system.
So there are many ways on how research is funded and how and to whom the results and even IPRs become available. it is not unusual that whoever pays for it, gets to (part) own the result. Companies subcontract R&D and you can bet they own the research done by their subcontractor!
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Originally Posted by Jomz It is not a simple process where the CEO goes and asks for money and the government hands it over. The process involves invitation for research proposals on a topic, evaluation of proposals and capabilities, selection of the best candidate and then awarding of the money in stages. They way this differs from a subsidy is that, this is not an explicit money award targeted at a company.This is more like a competition and money is awarded to the winner. |
I’m reasonably aware on how these processes work. What I object to is that a specific company gets a grand to do research and subsequently use the research to develop its own commercial products. I don’t approve of such a mechanism of spending public money.
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Originally Posted by Jomz You must be joking when you told patents should belong to sponsor of the research!! |
See above, in the work done by Stanford was handed over to Audi in this particular case who, subsequently industrialised, commercialised and put some patents on it.
See above, companies subcontract their R&D and they will own the IPR and can get the patent subsequently in their name.
Neither Stanford or the Santa Fe Science institute or any scientific independent research facility hold many patents. Their purpose is to facilitate, promote and conduct scientific research. Nothing else. Mind you, Stanford has an endowment fund of over 20 billion USD, but that is something different.
It all depends on what you agree in your ‘research contract’.
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Originally Posted by Jomz On a similar vein, do you think patents of any company should belong to shareholders?? |
I work for a company that has more than 30.000 patents, and I am a (very small) shareholder as well. So I ‘own’ my share of those patents, not in the literally sense of course, but they do represent a certain value and in our case we also allow our patents to be used by others for which we get paid. As a shareholder I would like to see my shares increase in value (the patents hopefully help) and or see dividend.
Shareholders have influence over the companies strategy and therefor
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Originally Posted by Jomz Patents, belong to the primary research company, which employs the researcher - which might be either a company or a national lab.
Cummins has rights over the patent developed in our group. https://www.google.com/patents/US20150219027 |
A patent belongs to whoever files for and is subsequently awarded the patent. The knowledge, research, IPR etc can come from all sort of other parties and or individuals. You detail that out in a contract, or in some case the law has some default provisions.
E.g. in Europe IPR is with the original ‘author’ by default by law. Unless that author is an employee of a company in which case the IPR, by law, belongs to the company. (very simplified, IPR and patent laws are unbelievable complex).
Whereas I’m fine with government stimulating (fundamental) research through grants to researcher (which is actually most of the EC research as per the link you provide I believe). These researchers are held to the normal scientific publication norms etc. So what they do ends up in the public domain and can be used by others.
Where I draw the line is if the funded research is done by one or a limited number of commercial enterprise(s) who subsequently use it in their products and services. For me that is just a state subsidy. The state/governement should not be providing competitive advantages to a single or limit number of parties. I believe in an even playing field.
Jeroen