Eco-Patent Commons
Contents
Self-portrait
The mission of the Eco-Patent Commons is to manage a collection of patents pledged for unencumbered use by companies and intellectual property rights holders around the world to make it easier and faster to innovate and implement industrial processes that improve and protect the global environment.
Sharing knowledge and technology that protect the environment is one way to address a wide range of challenges and threats to our planet. One vital way to share such knowledge and technology is through making patented technology available. This is the first organized effort to make patents available, without royalty, to address a wide range of sustainability issues including waste, pollution, global warming and energy demands. (http://ecopatentcommons.org/about-eco-patent-commons)
The Eco-Patent Commons provides a unique opportunity for business to share innovation that can foster sustainable development. It was designed to facilitate the use of existing innovation that is protective of the environment, and encourage collaboration for new innovation through an online collection of environmentally beneficial patents pledged by the member companies for free use by anyone.
Since the launch of the Eco-Patent Commons by IBM, Nokia, Pitney Bowes, Sony and the World Business Council for Sustainable Development (WBCSD) in January 2008, about 100 patents have been pledged by 11 companies representing a variety of industries worldwide: Bosch, Dow, Fuji-Xerox, HP, IBM, Nokia, Pitney Bowes, Ricoh, Sony, Taisei and Xerox. The Environmental Law Institute became the host organization in 2013. (http://ecopatentcommons.org/)
Description
The purpose of Eco-Patent Commons was to give free access to a collection of patents to facilitate and expedite the implementation of industrial processes that improve or protect the environment, in order to provide the necessary knowledge and technology to assist in the solution of a large variety of problems such as waste, pollution, global warming and energy demands.
The project -ended in May 2016- was launched in January 2008 by IBM, Nokia, Pitney Bowes and SONY in collaboration with the World Business Council for Sustainable Development (WBCSD) to promote cooperation and collaboration among companies in the realization of joint actions for the development of pro-environmental strategies. The reasons why the project was completed can be found here.
The patents are part of a database on the Eco-Patent Commons web site. They must be innovations that provide environmental benefits such as energy conservation and efficiency, pollution prevention, use of environmentally preferable substances or materials, reduction of materials and increase recycling ability.
If some patents are the main source of income of a coporations, it is not the goal of this project to require their opening. However, there are others corporations that are not affected by sharing their patents. In such cases, this project promotes and facilitates the sharing process to become leaders of sustainable development.
The participating companies can benefit from global recognition of their contributions, as well as being able to use an efficient channel to share their innovations, and introduce new concepts to the public.
Some of the members of Eco-Patent commons include: Bosch, Dow, Fuji Xerox, HP, IBM, Nokia, Pitney Bowes, Ricoh, Sony and Xerox.
Interview
Scott Schang http://dpya.org/en/index.php/Scott_Schang
Links
URL: http://ecopatentcommons.org/
Wayback machine: http://web.archive.org/web/*/http://ecopatentcommons.org/
