Rights of first refusal and options to negotiate are tools used to facilitate technology transfer, particularly between universities and other research organisations, to companies. The legal status of these rights are often misunderstood. The legal status and enforceability of these rights is...

The joint ownership of a patent suggests a mutual and equal relationship between the joint owners, with each joint owner mutually and equally sharing the benefits of joint ownership with the other joint owners. But that is not the case. Joint ownership laws around the world can result in a joint...

All universities and other research organisations (for brevity, the term “university” is employed, and refers not just to a university, but to all forms of a non-for-profit research organisation) have intellectual property (IP) policies. Like other policies, they serve an important function,...