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Why Geim Never Patented Graphene

Posted by Soulskill on from the makes-perfect-sense dept.

gbrumfiel writes "As we discussed on Tuesday, Andre Geim won this year's Nobel prize in physics for graphene, but he never patented it. In an interview with Nature News, he explains why: 'We considered patenting; we prepared a patent and it was nearly filed. Then I had an interaction with a big, multinational electronics company. I approached a guy at a conference and said, "We've got this patent coming up, would you be interested in sponsoring it over the years?" It's quite expensive to keep a patent alive for 20 years. The guy told me, "We are looking at graphene, and it might have a future in the long term. If after ten years we find it's really as good as it promises, we will put a hundred patent lawyers on it to write a hundred patents a day, and you will spend the rest of your life, and the gross domestic product of your little island, suing us." That's a direct quote.'"

4 of 325 comments (clear)

  1. Name and Shame. by Hatta · · Score: 4, Interesting

    He could at least have mentioned which "big, multinational electronics company" he spoke with.

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  2. Re:But if he doesn't patent it... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Interesting

    That's how patents work in biotech. First you find a gene, then you immediately patent it - don't worry about figureing out what it does, because if you delay to do that a competitor might file first. Then you figure out what it does, and then you patent every possible application just to be safe. Commercial biotech research is basically driven by patents, but it can get extremally aggressive.

  3. Geim also won the Ig Nobel by walmass · · Score: 4, Interesting

    TFA asks: "Finally, are you one of those Nobel prizewinners who is going to go crazy now that you've won? "

    The interviewer probably didn't know that Dr. Geim won the Ig Nobel for levitating a frog.

    Between that and the fact that he cited saving taxpayer's money as a reason behind not filing a patent and his Friday experiments (which led to the scotch-tape on graphite) discovery, I think I have a new hero.

  4. Re:But if he doesn't patent it... by danpat · · Score: 4, Interesting

    The problem is that it takes less than those 5 engineers to get a crap patent into the system in the first place. When the cost of entry is lower than the cost of removal, the system is going to tend to fill up with crap.

    Now, if there was a fine levied against those that had their patents invalidated......