The website Latepatents.net has collated a top 100 list of companies with a link to their individual expired US patents. Said patents have expired due to failure to pay maintenance fees and not due to normal expiry. I checked a random sampling at the USPTO and found that indeed the patents were expired.
Readers will have to determine for themselves the value of these heaps of company treasure lying about the Public Domain landscape like so many abandoned Buicks, tanks still full of gas.
Given the quality of the companies that have the prematurely expired patents, and the resources they surely spend on IP management, I’ll hazard a guess that most of these patents were allowed to expire on purpose.
Patents are obtained for many reasons. One invention might lead to prompt and exclusive sales and profits for its owner. Another invention might lead to possible cash flow in the future if certain circumstances align properly. Some patents may be intended to be put up for lease or sale. Still other inventions serve to block competitors from facile entry into your line of business, so called “picket fence” patents.
It is not unusual for a given bit of intellectual property to become obsolete before the natural expiration of the patent. Technology can advance sufficiently such that a process or composition is no longer competitive. A company can move away from a technology package for business reasons having nothing to do with the suitability of the patented art.
Finally, I think that some patents are obtained simply because the company has a “policy” that requires the disclosure of inventions and subsequent mechanical submission to the attorneys. If you are a hammer, everything looks like a nail. If you’re running an intellectual property office, every disclosure looks like a patent.
If too many “improvements” turn into applications, it may not be the fault of over-eager patent attorneys. More likely, it is the result of choices made by company management. I have witnessed a few circumstances where managers have been reluctant to exercise business judgement and have heaped the decision to patent solely upon the hapless attorney. What choice does the attorney have but to prosecute the patent?
It is my opinion that business people far too frequently allow their attorneys to make IP business decisions for them. The typical excuse is that it is a “legal matter”. The question for a business person is this- Can we make a choice that prevents the issue from becoming a legal matter? Sometimes we use lawyers because we need a surrogate to do the dirty work for us.
The common default choice found in IP is that if it can be patented it should be patented. This is an expensive and weak-minded philosophy and I’ll wager that the patents in the aforementioned list are expired as a result of some second thoughts on the value of these inventions.
Lamentations on Chemistry 
An interesting list, but I have some thoughts and even specific items about the list. When I was at 3M, they starting for a while to assign to patents to “3M Innovative Properties” (IIRC), which was a legal entity created under 3M so that it would be easier to sell off the patents as desired. (Ever read “Rembrandt’s in the Attic”? The whole world of IP was suddenly up for sale. Funny how the world didn’t work out according to that prediction.) I recall similar arrangements with other companies as well, which can make it difficult to the the true assignment.
I was also struck by IBM being on the bottom of the list since they are always the top patenting US company. It looks like it is a mistake since the link seems to show 2904 expired patents, but they were ranked at #100 because of only having “104 expired patents”.
I did a search on my name and was surprised that 3M hasn’t let any of the my patents expire. When you kill a program and lay everyone off, why hang on to the patents?
Lastly, I strongly agree with your philisophical points, especially at this very point in time when the while legal stability is up in the air (see KSR v. Teleflex, ebay v. Mercantile, …) If you really have a good invention that is truely novel, by all means go for it. But in lesser cases, really consider what the merit is from all sides.
Sounds like a good thing that your 3M patents are not abandoned. I mean, from the satisfaction side. It’s not like companies pay much for them outside of salary. Did you at least get a silver dollar or dinner somewhere? A nice certificate suitable for hanging? A friend from GE showed me a silver dollar that he got.
My first patent is being prosecuted, so it’ll be a while before I get to see any token from it.
Honestly, I don’t know how the person who runs latepatents.net gathers the information. The PTO discloses expired patents, but I am unaware of any nifty way to collate the information like these guys do.
Abandoned patents can be revived under rule 1.137. The applicant must show the abandonment was unintentional or unavoidable. Hence some of the patents on that site may be eligible for resurrection.
If you intended to abandon the patent then this rule does not apply.
I’m glad that you pointed this out. I knew there was a way out under certain circumstances, but I’m not that intimately familiar with the code. Thanks.
I try not to give the appearance that I am a legal scholar. I do like to encourage business people to talk about patents issues because patents have a business dimension that is apart from the legal machinations. In my limited time working in this arena, I have come to see that business/technical people often shun the domain of patent law if for no other reason than unfamiliarity.