Showing posts with label patent portfolios. Show all posts
Showing posts with label patent portfolios. Show all posts

Wednesday, October 10, 2018

Microsoft open-sources its patent portfolio; ZDNet, October 10, 2018

Steven J. Vaughan-Nichols, ZDNet; Microsoft open-sources its patent portfolio

"Several years ago, I said the one thing Microsoft has to do -- to convince everyone in open source that it's truly an open-source supporter -- is stop using its patents against Android vendors. Now, it's joined the Open Invention Network (OIN), an open-source patent consortium. Microsoft has essentially agreed to grant a royalty-free and unrestricted license to its entire patent portfolio to all other OIN members.

Before Microsoft joined, OIN had more than 2,650 community members and owns more than 1,300 global patents and applications. OIN is the largest patent non-aggression community in history and represents a core set of open-source intellectual-property values. Its members include Google, IBM, Red Hat, and SUSE. The OIN patent license and member cross-licenses are available royalty-free to anyone who joins the OIN community."

Friday, August 31, 2018

IBM makes millions off patents, but it could make billions with open source; TechRepublic, August 24, 2018

Matt Asay, TechRepublic;

IBM makes millions off patents, but it could make billions with open source


"While patent collectors will often claim that their portfolio is a good indicator of the deep research and development they do, rarely do we see patent heft translate directly into product success. Why? Because rarely do products succeed simply because of technical merit.

Instead, the most successful companies are those that can execute (sales, marketing, etc.) around a product, whatever its technical merits. In this area, IBM has largely failed over the last decade...

IBM has long been one of the pioneers in open source software, which is where most usable innovation seems to be happening today. From TensorFlow to Apache Kafka to Kubernetes, if IBM wants to compete with modern technology giants like Google and Microsoft, it needs to innovate in the same way they do, too. Yes, they still gather patents, but their more interesting work emerges as open source software."