A medical giant is sharing its ventilator designs. Will that change anything?
While the Medtronic initiative appears to be off to a promising start, others expressed hope the company would go even further to promote technology sharing. Charles Duan, a patent expert at think tank R Street Institute, said he would like to see Medtronic follow the example of tech firms like IBM and Microsoft, which have contributed not just blueprints, but brainpower, to open-source initiatives.
"What would be more significant in my mind is if Medtronic makes available not just its existing designs but also its engineering team, to contribute to the many ongoing open-source ventilator projects," said Duan.
