Free patents to shake up fuel cell car sector

Japanese auto manufacturer Toyota plans to open access to more than 5,600 patents related to hydrogen fuel cells, a move expected to reshape the fuel cell vehicle sector, industry insiders said.

Toyota announced the plans at an international consumer electronics show in mid-January.

Niu Yu, a Toyota China spokesman, told China Business News that the company's fuel cell vehicles, or FCVs, and hybrid electric vehicles share a range of core technologies in motors and control systems.

Unlike Toyota's hybrid electric vehicles that have sold more than 7 million units worldwide, the company's FCVs still face a challenging market due to a shortage of infrastructure.

Opening-up the patents will help seek like-minded people in the FCV sector, reduce costs in R&D and production and promote the new type of clean energy-powered car, according to the company.

Compared to American electric carmaker Tesla, which announced plans to offer free use of its patents in June 2014, Toyota has set more restrictions, industry observers said.

Users need to file an application with Toyota and sign a contract for the patents.

Before the end of 2020, Toyota will offer use of the patents to automakers for free. These will include 1,970 patents related to fuel cells, about 290 concerning highpressured hydrogen storage and some 3,350 for control systems. After 2020, 70 patents concerning hydrogen refueling stations will remain free of charge.

The difference in patent opening-up policies between the two companies is closely linked to their competitiveness in patent portfolio and costs, Jia Jun, chief analyst at PatSnap, a patent research firm, told China Intellectual Property News.

Jia said Toyota's opening-up on the heel of the launch of its FCV Mirai last December had more influence than Tesla's smaller patent reservoir. Jia added that to further lower the hydrogen cell industry threshold, other carmakers with similar patents should follow suit, including Honda and General Motors.

Xu Yanhua, deputy secretary-general of the China Association of Automobile Manufacturers, told the newspaper that providing free access to patents will enable Toyota to have a greater say in the tech development path of hydrogen cell-powered cars and its related tech standards to go global.

"Any user can hardly surpass Toyota, which has more than 20 years of prowess in hydrogen fuel cell vehicles. The company has faith in that," Xu said.

FCVs have a longer industrial chain than hybrid electric vehicles and require an expanded infrastructure network. Toyota's decision will encourage more industrial players to get involved in FCV development and commercialization, she said.

"China has a weaker foundation for fuel cell development and the domestic industrial chain has yet to take shape," the IP newspaper quoted an anonymous source from the tech department of SAIC Motor.

"Toyota's patent opening-up provides Chinese automakers opportunities to learn, yet it is not easy to master related core technologies," he said. "So far there is not much adjustment in our fuel cell research orientation and tendency."

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