Historically Black colleges and universities are taking advantage of the extra funding generated by patents.
There has been an increase in patents created by HBCUs, reports The Plug Daily. The increase started in 2010 based on data from the United States Patent & Trademark Office’s (USPTO) patents database.
Thirty institutions own patents for intellectual property. The schools with the most patent rights are Morehouse School of Medicine, Howard University and Florida Agricultural and Technical University with 63, 53 and 41, respectively.
Universities with smaller endowments typically own less than 20 patents. Morehouse School of Medicine is actually over-performing since Howard is the HBCU with the largest endowment fund.
These findings are great news but HBCUs are still behind predominately white institutions. Before the Bayh-Dole Act passed in 1980, the federal government owned any intellectual property produced by schools who received aid.
When the law passed, colleges and universities were eager to earn funding from their patents. HBCUs pursued the opportunity but they only secured 101 patents between 1969 and 2012, according to another piece by The Plug. Half of those patents were granted between 2010 and 2012.
Meanwhile, the University of California Public School System owns 524, MIT has 306 and the University of Texas holds 219 patents.
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