Cyberinfrastructure and patent Thickets: Challenges and Responses by Gavin Clarkson

A common misconception exists among many scientists and engineers that a patent gives the owner the right to a particular technology. In fact, a patent does not guarantee the right to make or do anything. Instead, a patent gives the patent owner the right to exclude others from making, using, or selling anything that embodies the technology covered by the patent. When multiple organizations own patents that are collectively necessary to practice a particular technology, their rights form a “patent thicket” (Clarkson, 2005b), defined by Shapiro as “a dense web of overlapping intellectual property rights that a company must hack its way through in order to actually commercialize new technology.” [1]