The patenting of genes, or other scientific discoveries, need not interfere with the free exchange of information among scientists and is often the best way to bring the benefits of discoveries to the public, a Cornell representative told a congressional committee in Washington, D.C., July 13.
James A. Severson, president of the Cornell Research Foundation, testified before the House Committee on the Judiciary's Subcommittee on Courts and Intellectual Property, which is considering the question of whether or not it should be permissible to patent genes. The Cornell Research Foundation is a nonprofit subsidiary of Cornell which has as its mission to identify, protect and license for commercial development inventions made at the university. Severson also spoke in his capacity as president of the Association of University Technology Managers (AUTM). He appeared as part of a panel of witnesses that included representatives of commercial biotechnology companies, specialists in intellectual property law, cancer researchers and a bioethicist.
Patenting and licensing a discovery, Severson said in his opening statement, is often the best way to ensure that a discovery will be put to use, and it provides an incentive for researchers. He pointed to the Patents and Trademark Act of 1980 (also known as the Bayh-Dole Act), which granted universities the option of retaining title to inventions resulting from federally financed research. Prior to this act, the government retained title to such inventions, and while commercial interests could license the inventions, the process was cumbersome and few did, Severson said.
Since the act went into effect, he said, the exploitation of inventions made at universities and other nonprofit institutions has greatly expanded. He quoted an AUTM survey showing that since 1991, the number of annual patent applications by universities doubled to 11,704, the number of licenses that universities have entered into grew threefold to over 3,600, and in fiscal year 1998, 364 new companies were formed with university technology. For fiscal year 1998, he said, AUTM estimated that university technology transfer activity resulted in $33.5 billion in economic activity, supported 280,000 jobs in the economy and resulted in $7 billion in federal and state tax revenues.
An important issue, Severson said, is whether patenting will affect the publication and sharing of research results in academic circles. "In practice," he said, "the pursuit of a patent rarely delays the publication of results." University technology-transfer managers work with researchers to secure protection before results are due to be published or presented at public meetings, he said, citing examples from his Cornell experience.
Subsequently, he said, licensing the invention to commercial interests is the best way to spread the benefits of the invention to the public. Often, he pointed out, discoveries made at universities are very basic and require extensive further development to create useful products.
Transferring research results to the commercial marketplace, he concluded, "is an important way for universities, hospitals and research institutes to demonstrate the relevance of their research programs, introduce innovation into the commercial sector and enrich the lives of citizens. These discoveries can be pursued without disrupting the core values of publication and sharing of information, research results, materials and know-how."
In questioning following his statement, Severson was asked how universities use the income received from technology licensing and whether the inventor receives a share. He explained Cornell's policy, based on Bayh-Dole, in which a large portion of the income goes to the inventor and an additional portion to the inventor's research budget, with the remainder distributed to the department, the college and the university.
He was also asked if a professor had ever been sued over a patent. To the best of his knowledge, he replied, this has never happened.
"Overall I thought the tone was very positive," Severson said about the committee session on his return from Washington. "I expected more controversy between the witnesses [over the idea of private ownership of gene sequences], but the levels of disagreement were minor and relatively subtle."
Congressmen on the committee, he added, seemed uneasy over the difficulty of predicting where the science will lead and therefore the difficulty of setting policies about it.
Following his testimony, Severson joined Stephen Johnson, assistant vice president for government affairs, in lobbying visits to the chair of the subcommittee and to the staffs of members of Congress from New York state, including Rep. Sherwood Boehlert (R-23rd Dist.), Rep. Maurice Hinchey (D-26th Dist.) and Sen. Charles Schumer (D).
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