WASHINGTON-Two high-ranking House Science Committee Democrats have asked Energy Secretary Bill Richardson to investigate allegations of misconduct by the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in connection with the licensing of a potentially revolutionary wireless technology called micropower impulse radar.
A House Science Committee staff report questions whether the lab misappropriated MIR technology-which some say could drastically reduce the size of wireless devices-from inventor Larry Fullerton. The report said Fullerton, of Huntsville, Ala., heads Time Domain Corp. and may have patented the technology at issue in 1987.
The congressional report raises concerns about why the California lab, a unit of the Department of Energy, did not tell firms that bought rights to MIR that the technology might not be licensed by the government and that it could not be marketed legally.
In all, the report said 30 licenses for MIR were sold by the lab. The cost included an upfront licensing fee of $100,000 and a $25,000 minimum annual royalty payment.
“DoE needs to carefully examine the technology transfer activities at their labs to guarantee that this type of situation can’t occur again,” said California’s Rep. George Brown Jr. Rep. Bud Cramer (D-Ala.), another top committee member, called the lab’s actions outrageous.
The Lawrence Livermore National Lab, according to Cramer’s office, claims it developed the MIR technology independent of Fullerton, and the U.S. Patent Office last year rejected several claims in the lab’s patent based on Fullerton’s earlier work. The U.S. Patent Office has been asked by the lab to reconsider that ruling.
