The Indian Bayh Dole: A Boon, or Too Soon?

Abstract

A bill formulated on the lines of the U.S. Bayh Dole Act of 1980 is currently under consideration in the Parliament. The Bill aims to promote commercialization of inventions by vesting the patents of the same in the institution responsible for the invention. The following Article elaborates on the U.S. Bayh Dole Act and the implications of a similar Act, if passed, in India. While there is a perception that the Bayh Dole Act revolutionalized the U.S. patent industry, it nonetheless has had many equally, if not more, disadvantageous and dark sides as well. On the one hand, it seeks to promote transfer of technology and act as a catalyst to make the resultant products of the invention available to the public, while on the other hand it has been criticized as being an obstacle in access to research, thereby hampering discovery by other institutions. This is because not only is the product patented, but the methods and tools that are otherwise in the public domain also patented. The authors are of the opinion that the Bill in its present form can do more damage than good in a country like India as it fails to address the real problems that the Indian research institutions face like lack of focussed research, and therefore should not be passed. They have endeavoured to suggest other viable alternatives, like “partial-patents” and open source licensing through the means of this Article.

Keywords: Bayh Dole, India, Public Funded Universities, Patents