Businesses Can Adopt Sustainable Patent Strategies to Foster Innovation

Incentivizing businesses for their sustainable innovations begins with their intellectual property. The intangible nature of intellectual property makes it well-suited for sharing. By adopting sustainable patent strategies, companies can not only better address their own needs, but also address some of the most pressing needs of the planet. This is a new way businesses can lead by example.

Many companies have pursued sustainable business standards and practices over the last few years with an aim to improve their sustainability profile. In 2014, Amazon hired its first sustainability executive. Companies such as Patagonia are reforming themselves as benefit corporations to prioritize their environmental and social responsibilities. Last week, 253 companies including Wegmans, General Mills, Walmart, and Kellogg’s pledged to drastically reduce their food waste.

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Vikas is a staff writer for the Sustainable Development news and editorial section on Justmeans. He is an MBA with 20 years of managerial and entrepreneurial experience and global travel. He is the author of "The Power of Money" (Scholars, 2003), a book that presents a revolutionary monetary economic theory on poverty alleviation in the developing world. Vikas is also the official writer for an international social project for developing nations "Decisions for Life" run in collaboration between the ILO, the University of Amsterdam and the Indian Institute of Management.