On June 12th, US electric vehicle manufacturer Tesla published a blog under the title of "all our patent are belong to you", signed by Elon Musk, CEO of Tesla. With the opening of 2014 Brazilian World Cup, Tesla's unnormal activity of opening patent successful attracts everyone's attention to electric vehicle. The news spread rapidly all over the electric vehicle field as well as the intellectual property filed. What is the underlying cause for Tesla to act like that?

"At Tesla, however, we felt compelled to create patents out of concern that the big car companies would copy our technology and then use their massive manufacturing, sales and marketing power to overwhelm Tesla. We couldn't have been more wrong. The unfortunate reality is the opposite: electric car programs (or programs for any vehicle that doesn't burn hydrocarbons) at the major manufacturers are small to non-existent, constituting an average of far less than 1% of their total vehicle sales. Our true competition is not the small trickle of non-Tesla electric cars being produced, but rather the enormous flood of gasoline cars pouring out of the world's factories every day."Written in Musk's blog, "We believe that Tesla, other companies making electric cars, and the world would all benefit from a common, rapidly-evolving technology platform."

According to Professor Tao Xinliang, Dean of the Intellectual Property Institute of Shanghai University, Tesla's action means a lot. "Elon Must said and I quote, ‘Tesla will not initiate patent lawsuits against anyone who, in good faith, wants to use our technology.' He, who obviously not a philanthropist, did this just to burn his boats. For Tesla, the only way to keep itself and the whole electric vehicle industry developing is to build a well operated charging stations network. A wall of patents would limit the creation of compelling electric vehicles and stifle the popularization of electric vehicles. Based on the reasons above, we can see that Tesla's achievement of opening patents is to help building the charging stations network and enlarging the electric vehicle market, then lead to profit maximization."

"We believe that applying the open source philosophy to our patents will strengthen rather than diminish Tesla's position in this regard."Musk said so in his blog. Tao approved of the former, "Compared with keeping the patents of electric vehicle and battery as all their geese are swans, it is better to open the source and make development. Besides, as Tesla is taking the leading position in electric vehicle industry, it is hardly for others to avail of the opportunity to surpass Tesla. The whole industry's development will attract talents and of course Tesla will take the most advantages in this regard."  

It is hard to make a final conclusion that whether Tesla will lead the world united to beat down the gasoline cars industry or not, but Elon Must did show the world a free method of electric vehicle companies' patent operation.

(China IP News)