Subsidizing 'Patent Roulette'

Abstract:     
A recent report in Purdue University’s daily newspaper reveals that the school is losing money from a seemingly unlikely source: its patent portfolio. The Midwestern research juggernaut, ranked among the top-twenty graduate programs in engineering, computer science, chemistry, and agriculture, can’t seem to make a buck licensing the hundreds of patents it receives annually on faculty and student innovations.

Each year U.S. universities like Purdue apply for thousands of patents, spending up to fifty thousand dollars in legal fees per application, even though the technologies disclosed in a minuscule percentage will become products, let alone profitable ones.

Number of Pages in PDF File: 1

Keywords: university technology transfer, university TTLO, university TTO, university patent, Purdue, Stanford, WARF, Myriad

JEL Classification: O34, K00

Accepted Paper Series