The premise isn’t exactly right here. There are venture backed companies that primarily develop and license IP, like Qualcomm, ARM, and RAMBUS. Plus, like, the entire biopharma industry. Sometimes companies make spinoffs that just hold IP for joint ventures with other companies. So this does happen; there just needs to be infrastructure to use the IP, like people to manage the licensing process and a corporation to actually hold the IP, since it always needs to be assigned to someone (IP cannot legally exist in the ether). Investors do also sometimes take royalties in exchange for funding, which is like taking a stake in a patent.
What is true is that this isn’t quite institutionalized in the sense that there aren’t patent funds that just invest in patents. The closest is companies that acquire patents, like Intellectual Ventures. Note that in all of these instances there is a lot of diversification; you probably will attract investment in an ongoing R&D effort that monetizes through patents more so than just a patent itself, even in the above examples.
I think the reason for this is that the risk/reward profile isn’t there. Inventions have the same risk regardless of monetization method, but you have less control in the outcome if you just get an interest in a patent since so much of the commercial success has to do with other things which require people. Plus your margins will be higher but your revenue will be lower.
The premise isn’t exactly right here. There are venture backed companies that primarily develop and license IP, like Qualcomm, ARM, and RAMBUS. Plus, like, the entire biopharma industry. Sometimes companies make spinoffs that just hold IP for joint ventures with other companies. So this does happen; there just needs to be infrastructure to use the IP, like people to manage the licensing process and a corporation to actually hold the IP, since it always needs to be assigned to someone (IP cannot legally exist in the ether). Investors do also sometimes take royalties in exchange for funding, which is like taking a stake in a patent.
What is true is that this isn’t quite institutionalized in the sense that there aren’t patent funds that just invest in patents. The closest is companies that acquire patents, like Intellectual Ventures. Note that in all of these instances there is a lot of diversification; you probably will attract investment in an ongoing R&D effort that monetizes through patents more so than just a patent itself, even in the above examples.
I think the reason for this is that the risk/reward profile isn’t there. Inventions have the same risk regardless of monetization method, but you have less control in the outcome if you just get an interest in a patent since so much of the commercial success has to do with other things which require people. Plus your margins will be higher but your revenue will be lower.