Samsung opening hundreds of mobile patents to the masses

Samsung’s intellectual property spanning hundreds of patents and inventions will soon come within reach of the average Joe and Jane, royalty-free, like Samsung plans to be in the future. In its home country, that is, as the South Korean Ministry of Trade, Industry, and Energy revealed during a Friday morning presser.

That’s pretty much it as far as catches go. This being a form of government subsidy might be enough of a catch in an off itself, depending on how happy Koreans are with their current administration.

Coming up next: Samsung’s little nuclear project

But Samsung, for its part, will be opening 505 technologies to mid-sized companies across the country. Well, microenterprises are eligible for the program, as well, but it’d be safe to assume that not too many mom-and-op shops will be looking to take advantage of experimental smartphone tech and the like.

Boosting domestic economic growth has unsurprisingly been labeled the primary goal of this initiative. The exact list of technologies that Samsung will be licensing out will be available within the next couple of months. In the meantime, Korean business are free to apply for a royalty-free patent or 500 by June 10th. Over 200 of those open-sourced solutions will be smartphone-based, Seoul confirmed earlier today.

Looking at a slightly wider picture, this initiative is in line with Samsung’s growing focus on sustainability and responsible growth. It’s not like a conglomerate of its size has many more avenues for growth to choose from, anyway. But hey, as long as it cures a few crippling diseases along the way, right?