---
title: "To Do: Require Federal Research Agencies to Report Five Years of Data on Patent Licenses and Royalties"
summary: |-
  OMB should require federal research agencies to report five years of data on their patent licenses and royalties as part of its annual budget requests to apply pressure on them to improve.
date: "2018-07-30"
issues: ["Taxes and Budget", "Technology Diffusion"]
content_type: "Knowledge Base Articles"
canonical_url: "https://itif.org/publications/2018/07/30/to-do-require-federal-research-agencies-to-report-five-years-of-data-on-patent-licenses-and-royalties/"
---

# To Do: Require Federal Research Agencies to Report Five Years of Data on Patent Licenses and Royalties

# Recommendation

OMB should require federal research agencies to report five years of data on their patent licenses and royalties as part of its annual budget requests.

# Details

Federal agencies could do a better job of commercializing inventions and discoveries made in national labs and other federally funded research centers. Recent studies find federally funded university research is about five times more likely to result in a licensed patent technology than research funded at federal labs, and about seven times more likely to result in an active patent license. Requiring agencies to provide data on their licensing activities would apply pressure on lagging agencies and centers to improve and inculcate more competition among federal labs to inspire greater licensing activity.

**Keep reading:**

- Stephen J. Ezell and Robert D. Atkinson, “ITIF Comments Responding to Administration Request for Information Regarding Federal Technology Transfer Authorities and Processes” (ITIF, July 2018), [https://itif.org/publications/2018/07/30/comments-national-institute-standards-and-technology-regarding-federal](https://itif.org/publications/2018/07/30/comments-national-institute-standards-and-technology-regarding-federal).

---
*Source: Information Technology & Innovation Foundation (ITIF)*
*URL: https://itif.org/publications/2018/07/30/to-do-require-federal-research-agencies-to-report-five-years-of-data-on-patent-licenses-and-royalties/*