...but considering the exhibit floor doesn't open until 10am pacific time, I am surprised there are so many attendees there already. Since I am supposed to be there to man my company's booth, I hope the time machine is open-source and I can download a copy.
Someone above pointed out that Ford is paying royalties to Toyota for the hybrid technology, but they left out a critical point - Ford isn't actually using Toyota's hybrid technology - they created their own in-house that was so close to what Toyota beat them to market with, that they decided to be on the safe side they would license the technology from Toyota to avoid litigation.
It's hard to be an apologist for Toyota on this one when they have been using their own patents on the technology to collect royalties from another company already. Really, Ford and Toyota both should have been paying this other company from the beginning.
Toyota isn't this benevolent company. They make hybrids because it makes good business sense (if not profit, which arguably they do now). They are using their patents with other automakers in exactly the way this other company is attempting to.
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...but considering the exhibit floor doesn't open until 10am pacific time, I am surprised there are so many attendees there already. Since I am supposed to be there to man my company's booth, I hope the time machine is open-source and I can download a copy.
Someone above pointed out that Ford is paying royalties to Toyota for the hybrid technology, but they left out a critical point - Ford isn't actually using Toyota's hybrid technology - they created their own in-house that was so close to what Toyota beat them to market with, that they decided to be on the safe side they would license the technology from Toyota to avoid litigation.
It's hard to be an apologist for Toyota on this one when they have been using their own patents on the technology to collect royalties from another company already. Really, Ford and Toyota both should have been paying this other company from the beginning.
Toyota isn't this benevolent company. They make hybrids because it makes good business sense (if not profit, which arguably they do now). They are using their patents with other automakers in exactly the way this other company is attempting to.