Can a University claim a stake in student’s iOS App?

Although universities have historically had policies for inventions by faculty members, which typically grant them partial ownership of any potential commercial success from the technology or other advances created with university resources and/or on university time, there are few clear rules as to inventions by students, particularly when not using university resources.

The AP reports today on the interesting case at the University of Missouri.  Tony Brown, a Mizzou student and the creator of an iPhone App (Nearby) which has had more than a quarter million downloads and earned him the attention of Apple and Google.  The crucial question came as the student developer found out that the invention “…also raised a perplexing question when university lawyers abruptly demanded a 25 percent ownership stake and two-thirds of any profits.”  The question of the ownership of the intellectual property rights when a student creates something of value on campus, without a professor’s help, has many different answers, depending on the campus, and the stage at which each university finds itself in the road to adapting to the new technological environment.

To its credit, Mizzou adapted by explicitly giving student inventors the legal right to creations developed under specific circumstances. As is the case with researchers, for example, if university resources (human or financial) are used, then the university can assert an ownership right.

While this type of explicit policy is diffused across campuses, student entrepreneurs must be prepared to bear the burden of proving their invention(s) did not benefit from university resources, or be prepared to take on a silent partner in their profits.

This is another area where accelerating technological change, particularly ease of access to technology and tools, has enabled entrepreneurial efforts to be monetized earlier and at a faster pace.  Will this trend eventually require high school level courses on business law and intellectual property rights to be made mandatory in the not-too-distant future?  Probably…

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