NASA over the last month stated that it is auctioning off three sets of patents in an effort to increase the “down-to-Earth” benefits of NASA’s research and spread its technology to other industries. The patents covers technology related to software development, robotics, artificial intelligence, industrial process control and wireless sensor networks. The market results into not as of what NASA was planning for as this is what the organization found this week when it tried to auction three lots of its software patents at an event run by the ICAP Patent brokerage.
While a set of seven software development patents sold for $75,000, two other sets of patents went unclaimed. No one made a starting bid of $50,000 on a set of four patents covering autonomic computing or made a starting bid of $30,000 on one patent for autonomic safety systems. The patents were auctioned Thursday as part of a pilot program the space agency has been running for the past several years. This is the second time that NASA has sold patent licenses at auction, says Darryl Mitchell, a technology manager with Goddard’s Innovative Partnerships Program Office.
