UPDATED 23:01 EDT / APRIL 27 2015

NEWS

Uncle Sergey wants your IP: Google launches portal to buy patents

unclesamDo you have a spare technology patent lying around that you’d like to sell? Have we got a deal for you!

That may sound like a bad sales pitch, but Google does actually have a deal for patent holders looking to sell with its new Patent Purchase Promotion.

According to a post on the Google Public Policy Blog, the new program is an “experiment to remove friction from the patent market” by giving companies, particularly smaller ones, the opportunity to sell their patents to Google, versus patent trolls.

The program will run from May 8, 2015 through May 22, 2015, and will allow patent holders to shop their patents to Google for a possible sale; Google doesn’t promise to buy every patent presented but has committed to buying as many as possible.

“By simplifying the process and having a concentrated submission window, we can focus our efforts into quickly evaluating patent assets and getting responses back to potential sellers quickly” Deputy General Counsel for Patents at Google Allan Lo said. “Hopefully this will translate into better experiences for sellers, and remove the complications of working with entities such as patent trolls.”

“We’re always looking at ways that can help improve the patent landscape and make the patent system work better for everyone.”

OK…but…

 

Patent trolls are obviously a major problem, and you don’t need to watch an episode of Last Week Tonight on HBO to know that despite urgent legal reform being required, it’s not happening anytime soon.

But Google snapping up hundreds, potentially thousands of patents pitched as a countermeasure to the problem?

Yeah…crusading against something where you benefit exclusively from the solution doesn’t really pass a litmus test when it comes to acting for the greater good.

It highly unlikely that Google will end up buying world changing patents through the process, but likewise it takes only a minute amount of skepticism to notice the contradictions in the pitch.

Those who do want to sell their patents under the program will find out whether Google is interested in buying them by June 26th.


A message from John Furrier, co-founder of SiliconANGLE:

Your vote of support is important to us and it helps us keep the content FREE.

One click below supports our mission to provide free, deep, and relevant content.  

Join our community on YouTube

Join the community that includes more than 15,000 #CubeAlumni experts, including Amazon.com CEO Andy Jassy, Dell Technologies founder and CEO Michael Dell, Intel CEO Pat Gelsinger, and many more luminaries and experts.

“TheCUBE is an important partner to the industry. You guys really are a part of our events and we really appreciate you coming and I know people appreciate the content you create as well” – Andy Jassy

THANK YOU