University administrators are greedy parasites on innovation that still fail to actually make real money for their institutions

[Gerald, “Working through an old op/ed on university ownership of inventions,” Research Enterprise, 12/06/16, https://researchenterprise.org/2016/12/06/working-through-an-old-oped-on-university-ownership-of-inventions/, accessed 7/17/24, GDI-JCR]

What this conclusion does state–I am sure–is an administrative truth: that university administrators are committed to taking ownership of everything they can get, and using whatever they get to try to make as much money as they can. It’s just that the very acts of taking and trying to profit run counter to public accessibility and development. It would be more direct for the op/ed to assert “We believe that our administrative jobs depend on stripping inventors of their choices and offering monopoly positions to whomever shows up with money. We mitigate criticism of our scheme by holding out the prospect for huge payoffs, claiming that we act in the public interest, and–although it is rare–by sharing a portion of our gains with inventors (but not with their colleagues, even in the same research team).”

While we also believe the researcher should retain a portion of the invention’s revenue as well as maintain the name of inventor, his invention would be made better through technology transfer and be able to more swiftly impact the future of society.

This belief is beyond kind thought. First, what at all does university administrative belief have to do with “maintaining the name of inventor”? Is there some administrative idea that inventors should not be identified with patents on their inventions? That’s news to federal patent law. Is it that when the university takes ownership of inventions (and “earns” patents), administrators don’t feel any obligation to identify the inventors, but in response to appeals such as this one, they will come around to keeping inventors’ names attached to reports of inventions? This is all nonsense.

Next, look at the word “retain.” If we really wanted to use “retain” in this context, we would help inventors do their deals with companies (or whomever) and as a second step would consider the “equities” involved in the university’s support of the work to make and develop the invention. The claim would be to a financial interest in the invention arising from the actual circumstances of invention and development. If the university contributed in some material way–through authorizations or the work of others employed at the university–then some of whatever money there might be from the “transfer” of an invention might be shared with the university (and others), with the rest “retained” by the inventor. This process was one widely used before Bayh-Dole with its darkness spread over the land. University administrators (and faculty) argued that where it was equitable to share income from commercial ventures involving patents, income should be shared equitably. That proposition is difficult to muster an argument against.

But that’s not the argument that the op/ed presents. Instead, it uses “retain” in a mealy-mouthed way–having taken ownership of an inventor’s personal property, and without any consideration for circumstances other than the presence of “federal funding,” university administrators should take ownership of all inventions. Not inventions for which their assistance is requested. Not just those inventions that an investigator believes should be advanced using a patent. All inventions. And all “creations,” too. Everything gets gobbled up. Everything falls under the dominion of administrators.

I’m sure that this op/ed states a widespread belief held by university administrators. They, not inventors nor anyone chosen by inventors, should decide how the results of scholarship should be dealt with, and their preference is to create monopolies (based on patents when possible) and offer those monopolies to speculators, hoping for a big payout. This operating model is successful with only 1 deal a decade, or 1 deal every two decades, or even 1 deal every three decades. And that’s good enough, apparently.

This op/ed is more than five years old. The Supreme Court ruled in Stanford v Roche that Bayh-Dole doesn’t give universities ownership of anything. But that beat down hasn’t changed university administrative beliefs. They still believe that universities should own everything, and that this ownership is much better than individuals having choices, and this ownership will result in better, faster public access to research “inventions and creations”–when the evidence after thirty-five years of Bayh-Dole does not support the position. Even at the time Bayh-Dole was passed, those advocating for it admitted university licensing had not done so well, and that only a handful of inventions in 1,000 would earn millions. Turns out it is much less than a handful. At Stanford, 3 in 6,400 inventions over some 36 years–a rate of 0.05%. At most other places, the rate effectively rounds to 0%. But for this, administrators rape what they want and persist in claiming they do it for the public, despite showing no concern for whether what they claim is true.

There is often public benefit in making research findings available–especially when the findings are not themselves full of errors and cherry-picking and falsification and political spin. There may even be public benefit in obtaining patents on some small set of such findings. And there may even be public benefit in, every blue moon, in using a patent to create a monopoly that locks out other commercial development in favor of one company or one group of speculators over others. But there is no compelling reason–other than that the plantation owners like the position they are in–that university patent administrators are the first, best, or only people who can decide what inventions should be owned, what patents should be got, what strategies should be used, and what special favorite companies and investors should be brought in on monopoly deals.