You cannot "buy up" important patents and suppress them. The Patent Office will not allow that. Any technology of importance must be marketed or licensed, or the patent will be rescinded. That is what the Constitution says. Patents are issued "to promote the progress of science and useful arts, by securing for limited times to authors and inventors the exclusive right to their respective writings and discoveries." If the patent does not promote progress, it is being abused, and the Patent Office will intervene.
You can buy up and suppress obscure, unimportant patents that would have no economic impact. An improved internal combustion engine is not in that category.
In actual fact, internal combustion engine efficiency has improved tremendously since the 1960s. Hybrid engines now get 50 mpg, which is far better than anything available in 1980. However, electric cars are 2 to 5 times more efficient than the best gasoline models, cheaper per passenger mile, cheaper to maintain, and they will soon be cheaper to manufacture. So there is no question they will replace gasoline models. Nothing can stop that. Trying to stop it would be like trying to protect the markets for vacuum tube computers and slide rules.
Exactly. Everything changes. You can't stop. If auto workers want to vote for Republicans because they think it will stall electric cars, I've got some buggy whips to sell them.
Thank you. I have been listening to the "Oil companies are buying up patents for more efficient IC engines" line for many years and it makes no sense. Good to know that it is not even possible. Even if it were, patents only last for 20 years and I have been hearing that line for at least 60 years.
No according to an expert patent lawyer and various Federal and military officials I talked to. They all told me the Patent Office takes a "dim view" of corporations that try to use patents to prevent progress, rather than foster it. It is a violation of the Constitution. There are some famous cases, such as when the government insisted that AT&T license the transistor. This was tied in with the antitrust rulings at the time, but it was also in reference to the purpose expressed in the Constitution. That's what the experts told me, anyway. I don't know much about it.
The Enquirer buying up stories had nothing to do with the Constitution, or patent law.
Unimportant patents can be targeted, as I said. The Patent Office will not bother to rule against this.
Patents only last 20 years in any case, so you could not "suppress" technology for long. Any significant improvement to an internal combustion engine would be a major competitive advantage to a carmaker. In the 1970s and 80s, Japanese cars with better gas mileage blew the U.S. carmakers out of the water. The Big Three never recovered. An automaker that ignores major technological improvements is doomed.
Yes, the experts I talked to also said this was part of the antitrust settlement, as I said. They described some other well known cases in which the P.O. insisted the patented technology be marketed or licensed. Unfortunately, I had this conversation decades ago and I do not recall the other examples.
You wrote: "Don’t see how the patent office can force a private business to produce anything from a patent they own - AGAIN . . ." The experts told me the Patent Office does this by revoking the patent. (Or threatening to revoke it.) The P.O. can revoke a patent for a variety of reasons. Most often because someone finds there was previous claim.
They do not force the business to produce. They force it to either produce or license others to produce. "Use it or lose it." That's what the experts told me, but I do not know the details.
This would never happen with some minor improvement. There are more minor patents than you might think. See, for example:
Memory chips represent more than 53,000 granted patents and more than 42,600 applications divided into more than 31,200 separate patent families."
All 53,000 cannot be important.
Imagine trying to wade through that ocean of patents before manufacturing a memory chip!
I should add that most of the experts I knew were in the U.S. Navy research labs including the NRL in DC. They were talking about patents that Uncle Sam wanted to use to make radars and other stuff the Navy was working on.
You cannot "buy up" important patents and suppress them. The Patent Office will not allow that. Any technology of importance must be marketed or licensed, or the patent will be rescinded. That is what the Constitution says. Patents are issued "to promote the progress of science and useful arts, by securing for limited times to authors and inventors the exclusive right to their respective writings and discoveries." If the patent does not promote progress, it is being abused, and the Patent Office will intervene.
You can buy up and suppress obscure, unimportant patents that would have no economic impact. An improved internal combustion engine is not in that category.
In actual fact, internal combustion engine efficiency has improved tremendously since the 1960s. Hybrid engines now get 50 mpg, which is far better than anything available in 1980. However, electric cars are 2 to 5 times more efficient than the best gasoline models, cheaper per passenger mile, cheaper to maintain, and they will soon be cheaper to manufacture. So there is no question they will replace gasoline models. Nothing can stop that. Trying to stop it would be like trying to protect the markets for vacuum tube computers and slide rules.
Exactly. Everything changes. You can't stop. If auto workers want to vote for Republicans because they think it will stall electric cars, I've got some buggy whips to sell them.
Thank you. I have been listening to the "Oil companies are buying up patents for more efficient IC engines" line for many years and it makes no sense. Good to know that it is not even possible. Even if it were, patents only last for 20 years and I have been hearing that line for at least 60 years.
It's a bogus left wing conspiracy theories. It's not just us right wingers who have crazy conspiracy theories.
No according to an expert patent lawyer and various Federal and military officials I talked to. They all told me the Patent Office takes a "dim view" of corporations that try to use patents to prevent progress, rather than foster it. It is a violation of the Constitution. There are some famous cases, such as when the government insisted that AT&T license the transistor. This was tied in with the antitrust rulings at the time, but it was also in reference to the purpose expressed in the Constitution. That's what the experts told me, anyway. I don't know much about it.
The Enquirer buying up stories had nothing to do with the Constitution, or patent law.
Unimportant patents can be targeted, as I said. The Patent Office will not bother to rule against this.
Patents only last 20 years in any case, so you could not "suppress" technology for long. Any significant improvement to an internal combustion engine would be a major competitive advantage to a carmaker. In the 1970s and 80s, Japanese cars with better gas mileage blew the U.S. carmakers out of the water. The Big Three never recovered. An automaker that ignores major technological improvements is doomed.
Yes, the experts I talked to also said this was part of the antitrust settlement, as I said. They described some other well known cases in which the P.O. insisted the patented technology be marketed or licensed. Unfortunately, I had this conversation decades ago and I do not recall the other examples.
You wrote: "Don’t see how the patent office can force a private business to produce anything from a patent they own - AGAIN . . ." The experts told me the Patent Office does this by revoking the patent. (Or threatening to revoke it.) The P.O. can revoke a patent for a variety of reasons. Most often because someone finds there was previous claim.
They do not force the business to produce. They force it to either produce or license others to produce. "Use it or lose it." That's what the experts told me, but I do not know the details.
This would never happen with some minor improvement. There are more minor patents than you might think. See, for example:
https://www.upcounsel.com/semiconductor-patents
QUOTE:
"Semiconductor (Memory Chips) Patents
Memory chips represent more than 53,000 granted patents and more than 42,600 applications divided into more than 31,200 separate patent families."
All 53,000 cannot be important.
Imagine trying to wade through that ocean of patents before manufacturing a memory chip!
I should add that most of the experts I knew were in the U.S. Navy research labs including the NRL in DC. They were talking about patents that Uncle Sam wanted to use to make radars and other stuff the Navy was working on.