Tesla Motors Open up Patent Portfolio

In a somewhat altruistic move and a clear move to promote more innovation in the electric car segment, Tesla Motors (NYSE: TSLA) announced that their patents are now available for anyone to use.

http://www.teslamotors.com/blog/all-our-patent-are-belong-you

Tesla Motors was created to accelerate the advent of sustainable transport. If we clear a path to the creation of compelling electric vehicles, but then lay intellectual property landmines behind us to inhibit others, we are acting in a manner contrary to that goal. Tesla will not initiate patent lawsuits against anyone who, in good faith, wants to use our technology.

Musk goes on to say and take a dig (rightfully so) at the (solely) materially minded folks in the legal profession:

 I thought patents were a good thing and worked hard to obtain them. And maybe they were good long ago, but too often these days they serve merely to stifle progress, entrench the positions of giant corporations and enrich those in the legal profession, rather than the actual inventors.

and

Given that annual new vehicle production is approaching 100 million per year and the global fleet is approximately 2 billion cars, it is impossible for Tesla to build electric cars fast enough to address the carbon crisis. By the same token, it means the market is enormous. 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. 

A great way to locate these specific Tesla patents is to use the google search:

https://www.google.com/search?tbo=p&tbm=pts&hl=en&q=inassignee:%22Tesla+Motors,+Inc.%22

(hat tip: negativo17@gmail.com )

Good luck to Tesla Motors and also to highly efficiency electric cars!