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Living Room / Re: Patents given away? Elon Musk blazing a different sort of trail.
« Last post by wraith808 on June 13, 2014, 10:10 AM »Interesting analysis of Tesla's move on Harvard Business Review.
More at link.
The first thing to note is that Tesla is not truly giving away its secret sauce, the source of its competitive advantage. “There’s a lot of thinking in the research these days on the gap between the codified knowledge that is patentable and gets disclosed versus tacit knowledge that really exists in how you actually produce,” says Orly Lobel, a law professor at the University of San Diego specializing in intellectual property. “That gap is probably relevant in this market.”
A Tesla vehicle is quite literally more valuable than the sum of the parts, even when the value of the patented technology is included. “They have this sexy car that people are increasingly liking,” says Lobel. “It’s something different from just the aggregation of the knowledge in the patents.”
That thinking is echoed by Alberto Galasso, another IP expert at the University of Toronto, who put it this way: “A patent on a great technology is worth nothing if there is no threat of imitation.” Access to the patents doesn’t ensure that a competitor can execute on an equally innovative product.
Tesla is trying to thread the needle of expanding the industry without giving up its competitive position. By giving away access to its patents it is offering competitors a leg up, but not fully ceding its lead in innovation.
“Tesla is very much the dominant innovator in the industry, so it can afford making that move,” Lobel told me, adding that the company may hope that it will trigger reciprocal action by others equally committed to furthering the industry.
More at link.
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