Tesla Advocates Open-Sourcing Of Patents In Blog

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CEO Elon Musk took an unprecedented stance on the company's intellectual property, commenting, "Tesla will not initiate patent lawsuits against anyone who, in good faith, wants to use our technology." Musk explained the company was created to accelerate the transition towards sustainable transportation and to lay "intellectual property landmines" in their wake would be in contradiction of that goal. "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." According to Musk, Tesla originally felt the need to obtain patents to stave off the auto giants from stealing its technology and using their enormous scale to overwhelm the company. In reality, Musk explained, the opposite happened. Electric vehicles make up a minuscule amount of the auto industry's business - representing less than one percent of the industry's overall sales. "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." The team at Tesla actually believes that allowing its patents to be open-sourced will actually strengthen the company. Musk noted that patents serve as little more than a road bump to a determined competitor and that the true advantage comes from attracting and motivating the world's best engineers.