Open the door for innovation

According to some professors, Duke’s overly restrictive intellectual property policies are hampering the University’s ability to achieve its full entrepreneurial potential. A portion of Duke’s Policy on Inventions, Patents and Technology Transfer allows the University to collect 50 to 75 percent of the net profit made off of faculty or student inventions that are made with institutional resources. Although questions surrounding Duke’s intellectual property policies are complex, a liberalized policy that demands less in royalties is both fairer to innovators and in the best interest of the University.

An upcoming review of Duke’s policies, which was commissioned by President Richard Brodhead to be carried out by Gregory Wray, chair of the University Committee on Patent Policy, should endeavor to tackle two questions.

From a philosophical perspective, the University must critically assess the legitimate scope of its claims to the profit made by faculty and student inventions. In the past, these claims have been predicated on pedagogical grounds: Since University instruction and facilities enables students to create new, pragmatic inventions, Duke should be entitled to a portion of the profit made from inventions that rely on such mentoring and resources. This claim, however, has little merit. Students accrue benefits from the University throughout their time here and use that knowledge in a variety of ways after graduation. That’s simply the function of the University.

The resource claim is more difficult to assess. Undeniably, the University makes innovation possible by bearing the costs of resource-intensive research and development, permitting students and faculty the financial security and intellectual support to engage in innovative projects. Although the University should be compensated to some extent, the current policy represents an undue penalty on projects in technology-intensive fields. Because the inputs and outputs of engineering and medical projects are immediately monetarily quantifiable—in the form of laboratory space, supplies and raw materials as well as patents—it is easier to practically assess the extent of Duke’s involvement. Yet practicality alone should not constitute a justification.

Even though we agree on the principle that no invention is produced alone—and grant that the University is in some part responsible for the inventions that students and faculty introduce—there is a practical argument for liberalizing intellectual property policies.

If promoting entrepreneurship is an institutional goal, then Duke should do everything in its power to incentivize risk-taking innovation. A culture conducive to entrepreneurship requires that all potential impediments are mitigated, which will signal to current and future innovators that the University is fully behind them. Whatever costs Duke will bear will likely be offset by the potential reputational benefits that the University will accrue as successful inventors become socially prominent. Further, Duke will be able to more concretely convey its role in growing entrepreneurship to prospective students and faculty.

Again, liberalized intellectual property policies will not by themselves inculcate the type of innovative culture Duke seeks to promote. Still, it is important both practically and philosophically for the University to do everything in its power to facilitate innovative activities. Going forward, Duke should be primarily concerned with allowing entrepreneurship to flourish, instead of acting as a gatekeeper to inventions’ immediate monetary benefits.