13 May 2020
In consideration of the health emergency that the whole world is going through, Leonardo has undertaken several initiatives to support all those who are daily engaged in the containment of the epidemic from Covid-19 in these difficult moments.
By making its planes and helicopters available in order to counter the spread of the epidemic, by creating 3D valves for emergency oxygen terapy masks, by granting free use of Threat Intelligence services for the cyber-resilience of companies and organizations, amongst other initiatives, Leonardo is demonstrating to be among the main actors in the Aerospace, Defense and Security sectors that are not sitting on their hands.
Even people who deal with Intellectual Property in Hi-Tech sectors are called to play their part: it is necessary to share the knowledge accumulated by large companies, by small and medium-sized enterprises, universities and research institutes, to make them available to anyone who is working on solutions against Covid-19 in order to defend the health of the citizens.
Pledging to leave aside the complex management of Intellectual Property rights (in particular patents and copyrights) and cooperate for a higher purpose: this is one of the objectives of the Open COVID Pledge initiative, promoted by experts in licensing matter, law firms, hi-tech companies and representatives of the scientific community.
By joining this initiative, individuals, institutions, companies and other organizations pledges to grant a "non-exclusive, royalty-free, worldwide, fully paid-up license (without the right to sublicense)” to exploit their Intellectual Property in products, compounds, services and other things covered by that right “for the sole purpose of ending the ‘COVID-19 Pandemic" and "minimizing the impact of the disease, including without limitation the diagnosis, prevention, containment, and treatment of the COVID-19 Pandemic.”
Global technology leaders and policy groups like Intel, Microsoft, Mozilla, Creative Commons, Amazon, Sandia National Labs, AT&T and Uber are supporting the pledge initiative; most of these are committing their patents to the fight against COVID-19, adopting one of the Open COVID License models available or, alternatively, a custom license that is consistent with the Open COVID Pledge.