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IBM, Sony, Nokia share green IP

Mirroring the open-source model and the move by many major industry players to platform-sharing alliances, a group of companies including IBM, Sony, Nokia, and Pitney Bowes have agreed to release dozens of environmentally responsible patents to the public domain.

The IP portfolio, dubbed Eco-Patents Commons, is being managed by the World Business Council for Sustainable Development (WBCSD) and is available via a dedicated Web site hosted by the Geneva-based group, which represents some 200 international companies. 

Patents pledged to Eco-Patent Commons focus on environmental matters and innovations in manufacturing or business processes where the solution provides an environmental benefit, IBM said, exampling a patent for a manufacturing process that reduces hazardous waste generation or a logistics patent that may reduce fuel consumption. 

"The Eco-Patent Commons provides a unique and significant leadership opportunity for business to make a difference -- sharing their innovations and solutions in support of sustainable development," said Bjorn Stigson, president of the WBCSD, in a statement today. "The Eco-Patent Commons also provides an opportunity for companies and other entities to identify areas of common interest and establish new relationships that can lead to further development in the patented technologies and elsewhere."

The idea of sharing IP for the greater good is nothing new. The project follows in the footsteps of IBM’s Common Platform Alliance, which bring together competing players in the semiconductor industry in an effort to curb runaway R&D costs at the leading edge of Moore’s Law. It further echoes the open-source licensing effort, the strength of which was recently exampled by Google’s Android mobile phone platform move.

"Innovation to address environmental issues will require both the application of technology as well as new models for sharing intellectual property among companies in different industries," said Dr. John E. Kelly III, senior VP and director of IBM Research, in the statement. "In addition to enabling new players to engage in protecting the environment, the free exchange of valuable intellectual property will accelerate work on the next level of environmental challenges. We strongly urge other companies to contribute to the Eco-Patent Commons."

IBM said membership in the Eco-Patent Commons is open to all individuals and companies pledging one or more patents with the selection and submission of each patent pledged at the organization's discretion.  

Among the patents contributed so far are: “Systems and methods for recycling of cell phones at the end of life” by Nokia; “Flocculating agent and a method for flocculation” by Sony; “Chemical pre-treatment and biological destruction of propylene carbonate waste streams effluent streams to reduce the biological oxygen demand thereof " by IBM; and “Multiple overload protection for electronic scales” by mailing-systems maker Pitney.

There's a couple of patents towards the bottom that might help the Swan River Trust!