Network Working Group                                        V. See, Ed.
Request for Comments: 3905                                     Microsoft
Category: Informational                                   September 2004


  A Template for IETF Patent Disclosures and Licensing Declarations

Status of this Memo

  This memo provides information for the Internet community.  It does
  not specify an Internet standard of any kind.  Distribution of this
  memo is unlimited.

Copyright Notice

  Copyright (C) The Internet Society (2004).

Abstract

  This document describes a proposal for one form of a template for
  IETF patent disclosures and licensing declarations.  The optional use
  of this template is meant to simplify the process of such disclosures
  and licensing declarations and to assist disclosers in providing the
  necessary information to meet the obligations documented in RFC 3668.

Table of Contents

  1. Introduction...................................................  1
  2. The Patent Disclosure and Licensing Declaration Template.......  2
  3. Commentary on Terms Used in the Template.......................  5
  4. Security Considerations........................................  7
  5. Normative References...........................................  7
  6. Acknowledgments................................................  7
  7  Editor's Address...............................................  8
  8. Authors' Addresses.............................................  8
  9. Full Copyright Statement.......................................  9

1.  Introduction

  RFC 3668 [RFC3668] documents the current IETF policies and
  obligations with respect to disclosure of patents and patent
  applications.  It also documents the information requested in
  licensing declarations for IETF specifications.  In the interest of
  making these patent disclosure and licensing declaration processes
  simpler, this document proposes a patent disclosure and licensing
  declaration template that may be optionally used as one method for
  IETF participants and patent holders to comply with patent disclosure
  requirements and licensing declaration provisions under RFC 3668.



See, Ed.                     Informational                      [Page 1]

RFC 3905     Patent Disclosures and Licensing DeclarationsSeptember 2004


  This proposal also may be optionally used as a model by the IETF
  Secretariat for Web-based disclosure and licensing declaration tools;
  however, the intent of this document is informational and is not
  meant to suggest that this is the only method that could be used by
  IETF participants for disclosure of patents or for licensing
  declarations.  For the latest information on how to submit a patent
  disclosure or licensing declaration, please see
  http://www.ietf.org/ipr-instructions.

  IPR disclosures should be submitted in English, since this is the
  working language of the IETF.  Names of persons and companies should
  be presented in the way they are usually presented in an English-
  speaking context.

2.  The Patent Disclosure and Licensing Declaration Template

  START OF TEMPLATE

  This document is an IETF Patent Disclosure and Licensing Declaration
  Template and is submitted to inform the IETF of a) patent information
  regarding the IETF document or contribution listed in Section IV, and
  b) a Patent Holder's intention with respect to the licensing of its
  necessary patent claims.  No actual license is implied by submission
  of this template.  Please complete and submit a separate template for
  each IETF document or contribution to which the disclosed patent
  information relates.

  I. Patent Holder/Applicant ("Patent Holder")

  Legal Name:

  II. Patent Holder's Contact for License Application

  Name:

  Title:

  Department:

  Address:

  Telephone:

  Fax:

  Email:





See, Ed.                     Informational                      [Page 2]

RFC 3905     Patent Disclosures and Licensing DeclarationsSeptember 2004


  III. Contact Information for the IETF Participant Whose Personal
  Belief Triggered the Disclosure in this Template (Optional)

  Name:

  Title:

  Department:

  Address:

  Telephone:

  Fax:

  Email:

  IV. IETF Document or Contribution to Which Patent Disclosure Relates

  Title:

  RFC Number or I-D Tag:

  Other Designations:

  V. Disclosure of Patent Information (i.e., patents or patent
  applications required to be disclosed by Section 6 of RFC 3668)

  A. For granted patents or published pending patent applications,
  please provide the following information:

  Patent, Serial, Publication, Registration, or Application/File
  number(s):

  Date(s) granted or applied for (YYYY-MM-DD):

  Country(ies):

  B. Does your disclosure relate to an unpublished pending patent
  application?

  Select one:  Yes  ______  No ______









See, Ed.                     Informational                      [Page 3]

RFC 3905     Patent Disclosures and Licensing DeclarationsSeptember 2004


  C. If an Internet-Draft or RFC includes multiple parts and it is not
  reasonably apparent which part of such an Internet-Draft or RFC is
  alleged to be covered by the patent information disclosed in Section
  V(A) or V(B), it is helpful if the discloser identifies here the
  sections of the Internet-Draft or RFC that are alleged to be so
  covered.

  VI. Licensing Declaration

  The Patent Holder states that its position with respect to licensing
  any patent claims contained in the patent(s) or patent application(s)
  disclosed above that would necessarily be infringed by implementation
  of the technology required by the relevant IETF specification
  ("Necessary Patent Claims"), for the purpose of implementing such a
  specification, is as follows (select one licensing declaration option
  only):

  a) ___   No License Required for Implementers
             Check here if commitment to forgo a license is limited
             solely to standards-track RFCs ___

  b) ___   Royalty-Free, Reasonable, and Non-Discriminatory License to
           All Implementers
             Check here if this commitment to license is limited solely
             to standards-track RFCs ___

  c) ___   Reasonable and Non-Discriminatory License to All
           Implementers with Possible Royalty/Fee
             Check here if this commitment to license is limited solely
             to standards-track RFCs ___

  d) ___   Licensing Declaration to be Provided Later (implies a
           willingness to commit to the provisions of a), b), or c)
           above; otherwise, the next option - "Unwilling to Commit to
           the Provisions of a), b), or c) Above" - must be selected)

  e) ___   Unwilling to Commit to the Provisions of a), b), or c)
           Above

  NOTE: The individual submitting this template represents and warrants
  that he or she is authorized by the Patent Holder to agree to the
  above-selected licensing declaration.

  VII. Contact Information of Submitter of this Form (if different from
  IETF Participant in Section III above)






See, Ed.                     Informational                      [Page 4]

RFC 3905     Patent Disclosures and Licensing DeclarationsSeptember 2004


  Name:

  Title:

  Department:

  Address:

  Telephone:

  Fax:

  Email:

  VIII. Other Notes:

  END OF TEMPLATE

3.  Commentary on Terms Used in the Template

  Section III requests contact information for the Patent Holder's IETF
  participant whose personal belief that necessary patent claims are
  implicated by an IETF document or contribution caused this template
  to be filed.  This is an optional section.  However, if Section III
  is not completed, then Section VII must be completed.  Even if
  Section III is completed, Section VII must still be completed if the
  submitter of this template is different from the IETF participant
  identified in Section III.

  The "Other Designations" field in Section IV may be used to identify
  an IETF contribution (oral or written) other than an Internet-Draft
  or RFC to which a disclosure is related.

  Here is an explanation of the licensing declaration options in
  Section VI of the template:

  a) No License Required for Implementers: The Patent Holder does not
     require parties to acquire any license to its Necessary Patent
     Claims in order to make, have made, use, import, offer to sell,
     sell, or distribute technology that implements such an IETF
     specification.

  b) Royalty-Free, Reasonable, and Non-Discriminatory License to All
     Implementers: The Patent Holder is willing, upon request, to grant
     a license to its Necessary Patent Claims to all persons on a
     royalty-free basis (i.e., no royalty or other fee) and under other
     reasonable and non-discriminatory terms and conditions, to make,




See, Ed.                     Informational                      [Page 5]

RFC 3905     Patent Disclosures and Licensing DeclarationsSeptember 2004


     have made, use, import, offer to sell, sell, and distribute
     technology that implements such an IETF specification.

  c) Reasonable and Non-Discriminatory License to All Implementers with
     Possible Royalty/Fee: The Patent Holder is willing, upon request,
     to grant a license to its Necessary Patent Claims to all persons
     under reasonable and non-discriminatory terms and conditions
     (which may include a royalty/fee), to make, have made, use,
     import, offer to sell, sell, and distribute technology that
     implements such an IETF specification.

  d) Licensing Declaration to be Provided Later: The Patent Holder is
     willing to commit to the provisions of a), b), or c) above, but
     wants to defer its specific selection of one of these licensing
     declaration options until a later point in time (or when asked for
     this information by the IESG).  This option may not be selected if
     the Patent Holder is unwilling to commit to the provisions of a),
     b), or c) above.  In that case, the Patent Holder must select
     licensing declaration option e) - "Unwilling to Commit to the
     Provisions of a), b), or c) Above."

  e) Unwilling to Commit to the Provisions of a), b), or c) Above: The
     Patent Holder indicates an unwillingness to commit to the
     provisions of any of options a), b), or c) described above.

  Options a), b), and c) above also allow the Patent Holder to indicate
  (with a check) whether its licensing declaration is limited solely to
  standards-track RFCs.  If left unchecked, the Patent Holder's
  licensing declaration will be deemed to apply to any implementation
  of the relevant IETF specification, including non-standards-track
  documents and Internet-Drafts.  However, the Patent Holder may list
  other conditions or restrictions on its commitment to forego a
  license (option a)) or on its commitment to license (options b) and
  c)) in Section VIII - "Other Notes."  This standards-track qualifier
  is not relevant to licensing declaration options d) and e), because
  under d) the Patent Holder has not yet indicated its specific
  licensing intention and under e) the Patent Holder has indicated a
  general refusal to commit to the provisions of any of options a), b),
  or c) above.

  Section VIII in the template, "Other Notes," may be used for any
  additional information a discloser or Patent Holder wishes to
  provide.  For example, a Patent Holder may use the "Other Notes"
  Section to indicate any other conditions or restrictions on the
  licensing declaration option selected in Section VI (e.g., 1)
  reciprocity, or 2) that a license will only be made available for
  implementations of any RFC (standards-track or non-standards-track),
  but not for implementations of Internet-Drafts or other documents).



See, Ed.                     Informational                      [Page 6]

RFC 3905     Patent Disclosures and Licensing DeclarationsSeptember 2004


4.  Security Considerations

  This document relates to the IETF process, not any particular
  technology.  There are security considerations when adopting any
  particular technology, regardless of whether patent or patent
  application disclosures or licensing declarations are implicated by
  such technology.  A working group should take those security
  considerations into account as one part of evaluating the technology,
  but there are no security considerations per se with these IETF
  processes.

5.  Normative References

  [RFC3668] Bradner, S., "Intellectual Property Rights in IETF
            Technology", BCP 79, RFC 3668, February 2004.

6.  Acknowledgments

  The authors acknowledge the thoughtful contributions of Harald
  Alvestrand and Scott Bradner to this document.































See, Ed.                     Informational                      [Page 7]

RFC 3905     Patent Disclosures and Licensing DeclarationsSeptember 2004


7.  Editor's Address

  Valerie See
  Microsoft Corporation
  One Microsoft Way
  Redmond, WA 98052 USA

  EMail: [email protected]

8.  Authors' Addresses

  Robert Barr
  Cisco Systems, Inc.
  170 West Tasman Drive
  San Jose, CA 95134 USA

  EMail: [email protected]


  Scott Brim
  Cisco Systems, Inc.
  146 Honess Lane
  Ithaca, NY 14850 USA

  EMail: [email protected]


  Paul Gleichauf
  Cisco Systems, Inc.
  170 West Tasman Drive
  San Jose, CA 95134 USA

  EMail: [email protected]


  Allen Lo
  Juniper Networks
  1194 North Mathilda Ave.
  Sunnyvale, CA 94089 USA

  EMail: [email protected]










See, Ed.                     Informational                      [Page 8]

RFC 3905     Patent Disclosures and Licensing DeclarationsSeptember 2004


9.  Full Copyright Statement

  Copyright (C) The Internet Society (2004).

  This document is subject to the rights, licenses and restrictions
  contained in BCP 78, and except as set forth therein, the authors
  retain all their rights.

  This document and the information contained herein are provided on an
  "AS IS" basis and THE CONTRIBUTOR, THE ORGANIZATION HE/S HE
  REPRESENTS OR IS SPONSORED BY (IF ANY), THE INTERNET SOCIETY AND THE
  INTERNET ENGINEERING TASK FORCE DISCLAIM ALL WARRANTIES, EXPRESS OR
  IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO ANY WARRANTY THAT THE USE OF
  THE INFORMATION HEREIN WILL NOT INFRINGE ANY RIGHTS OR ANY IMPLIED
  WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY OR FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE.

Intellectual Property

  The IETF takes no position regarding the validity or scope of any
  Intellectual Property Rights or other rights that might be claimed to
  pertain to the implementation or use of the technology described in
  this document or the extent to which any license under such rights
  might or might not be available; nor does it represent that it has
  made any independent effort to identify any such rights.  Information
  on the IETF's procedures with respect to rights in IETF Documents can
  be found in BCP 78 and BCP 79.

  Copies of IPR disclosures made to the IETF Secretariat and any
  assurances of licenses to be made available, or the result of an
  attempt made to obtain a general license or permission for the use of
  such proprietary rights by implementers or users of this
  specification can be obtained from the IETF on-line IPR repository at
  http://www.ietf.org/ipr.

  The IETF invites any interested party to bring to its attention any
  copyrights, patents or patent applications, or other proprietary
  rights that may cover technology that may be required to implement
  this standard.  Please address the information to the IETF at ietf-
  [email protected].

Acknowledgement

  Funding for the RFC Editor function is currently provided by the
  Internet Society.







See, Ed.                     Informational                      [Page 9]


You are viewing proxied material from gopher.fnord.one. The copyright of proxied material belongs to its original authors. Any comments or complaints in relation to proxied material should be directed to the original authors of the content concerned. Please see the disclaimer for more details.