Reply #144: News Release: Nanotech's Patents on the Building Blocks of Life [View All]

News Release: ETC's Report on Nanotechnology and Intellectual Property
Type: News Item
Date: June 16, 2005
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ETC Group

News Release

16 June 2005

www.etcgroup.org


ETC Group Releases New Report on Nanotechnology and Intellectual Property:

Nanotech's "Second Nature" Patents


Twenty-five years after the biotech industry got the green light to patent life, nanotech goes after the building blocks of life

 
On the 25th anniversary of Diamond vs. Chakrabarty,* the US Supreme Court's landmark decision (June 16, 1980) that opened the floodgates to the patenting of living organisms, ETC Group releases a new report, "Nanotech's 'Second Nature' Patents."


Since Chakrabarty, the biotech industry has worked hand-in-hand with governments to allow for the patenting of all biological products - the first monopoly grab over life. Chakrabarty set the stage for today's nanotechnology patents, where the reach of exclusive monopoly is not just on life - but the building blocks of life - nanotech's 'second nature' patents," explains Hope Shand, Research Director of ETC Group.


ETC Group's new report examines current trends in intellectual property and nanotechnology and the implications for the developing world. Nanotechnology refers to the manipulation of matter at the scale of atoms and molecules, where size is measured in billionths of meters.

http://www.etcgroup.org/article.asp?newsid=508