Profit or Progress? The Hidden Battle in Science
Written by Gabby Coleman
Edited by Aseel Albokhari
From movie scripts and Nike’s swoosh to insulin formulas and artificial heart valves, intellectual property (IP) protects human creativity and technical innovation through patents, copyrights, and trademarks. IP is protected by law through patents, copyrights, and trademarks, which allow individuals to earn recognition and financial benefits from their inventions [1].
Patents, which specifically protect inventions and solutions to technical problems, give inventors control over the commercial use of their invention for a limited time, usually 20 years, in exchange for publicly disclosing the invention [1]. To be patented, an invention must be novel, non-obvious, useful, and filed before any public disclosure that could invalidate the claim [2]. Since patent protection cannot be filed after an invention is publicly shared, timing is essential.
Photo from Cahit Cengizhan. Curated by Kayla Vance (kmv53@cornell.edu).
Researchers at universities, non-profit organizations, and government laboratories conduct the majority of basic and a substantial portion of applied research in the United States [3]. Despite this, before 1980, the rights to all patents resulting from research conducted with federal funding were attributed to the government.After the passage of the Bayh-Dole Act, perspectives on who owns and controls intellectual property from federally funded research shifted significantly, allowing universities and other institutions (not individual researchers) to retain ownership of such inventions, subject to federal oversight [3]. These acts allowed universities and researchers to keep patent rights to inventions made with government funding. Supporters of the Bayh-Dole Act argue that the framework has had a positive impact: it created new jobs, brought life-saving products to market, and contributed billions of dollars annually to the U.S. economy [3]. Opponents contend that the Act makes scientific knowledge less accessible, citing increased secrecy in licensing, limited data sharing, and restrictions on follow-on research [3]. The Stevenson-Wydler Act of 1980 sets similar standards for inventions at national labs, requiring agencies to establish technology transfer offices and allowing inventors to receive the first $2,000 in royalties from patented inventions and 15% of any additional revenue [3].
The traditional justification for patents is that they incentivize inventors to create new things. For government-funded researchers, this incentive appears to have a less drastic impact, as they already have funding and would likely carry out the research regardless. Since this traditional idea of incentivization doesn’t tend to transpire outside of the private sector, the strongest case for patenting publicly funded research is when an additional incentive is needed to commercialize it for the public good. For example, suppose a university lab develops a new possible drug, but cannot patent it. In that case, it’s unlikely that any company would fund the clinical trials needed to bring it to market. In instances like this, the Bayh-Dole Act prevents federally funded research from remaining idle [3].
Photos from FreePik. Curated by Kayla Vance (kmv53@cornell.edu).
On the flip side, sometimes patents are not necessary for university-based discoveries to be sought after. A large portion of patents issued to universities are non-exclusive, allowing the patent owner to grant the same licensing rights to multiple parties [4]. Coinciding with the passage of the Bayh-Dole Act in 1980, Stanford scientists Herbert Boyer and Stanley Cohen’s invention of recombinant DNA was successfully patented and licensed non-exclusively to over 400 firms, generating about $255 million in combined revenue for Stanford University and the University of California [3,5]. That same year, scientists at Columbia filed a patent for a technique to introduce foreign DNA into eukaryotic cells, which was eventually granted in 1983. The three patents filed to protect this technology came to be known as the Axel patents. Over the following years, they generated approximately $790 million in revenue through non-exclusive licensing to numerous biotechnology companies [6]. Foundational technologies, such as those patented under the Boyer-Cohen and Axel patents, likely would have achieved widespread use and commercialization even without patent protection, as early diffusion and citation data suggest their influence preceded enforcement [6]. This raises the question of whether Bayh-Dole patents should be limited to inventions that would not be commercialized without them.
The question of what drives academic research has only become increasingly relevant in the years since the Bayh-Dole Act was passed, especially in the rapidly evolving research landscape of recent years. For most researchers, the primary motives remain reputational, including receiving credit and being considered for tenure, as well as social, contributing to the public's good, rather than being purely financial.
Although the objective of Bayh-Dole was never to increase university revenue, its stated purpose was to promote the utilization of federally funded inventions in the public interest (35 U.S.C. §200) [3].The challenge now is how to balance the pursuit of science for its own sake with the growing pressure to turn discoveries into profit, especially as technology transfer revenues play a larger role in funding future innovation [3,6].
Gabby Coleman ’29 is in the College of Engineering. She can be reached at ggc38@cornell.edu.
Sources
[1] https://www.wipo.int/en/web/about-ip
[2] https://techtransfer.cancer.gov/investigators/patent-process
[3] https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3505030
[4] https://nkpatentlaw.com/patent-licensing-agreements/
[5] https://www.law.gwu.edu/bertram-rowland-and-cohenboyer-cloning-patent
[6] https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC2750841/#:~:text=The%20Axel%20patents%20claimed%20cotransformation,Bayh%2DDole%20Act%20of%201980.
