United States. After the Wright brothers were granted U.S. Patent 821,393 on May 22, 1906, for a “flying machine,” fierce competition erupted in the United States, quickly escalating into a patent war that included 12 major lawsuits, widespread media coverage, and an effort by Glenn Curtiss and the Smithsonian Institution to discredit the Wright brothers. By 1917, the two major patent holders, the Wright Company and the Curtiss Company, had effectively blocked the construction of new airplanes in the United States, which was desperately needed at the outbreak of World War I. The U.S. government, following a recommendation from the newly formed National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics, pressured the industry to form a cross-licensing organization (in other words, a patent pool), the Aircraft Manufacturers Association. All aircraft manufacturers were required to join the association, and each member was required to pay a relatively small lump sum (for the use of aeronautical patents) for each airplane produced; the majority of this would go to the Wright-Martin and Curtiss companies until their respective patents expired. This agreement was intended to last only for the duration of the war, but in 1918 the lawsuit was never renewed. Meanwhile, Wilbur Wright had died (in May 1912), and Orville had sold his interest in the Wright Company to a group of New York financiers (in October 1915) and retired from business. The lawsuits damaged the public image of the Wright brothers, who had previously been widely regarded as heroes. Critics claimed that the brothers’ actions could hinder the development of aviation, and compared their actions unfavorably to those of European inventors, who worked more openly. The Aircraft Manufacturers Association was an early example of a government-mandated patent pool. It has been used as an example in recent cases, such as the management of patents for antiretroviral drugs for HIV to provide access to otherwise expensive treatments in Africa. The Curtiss and Wright organizations merged in 1929 to form the Curtiss-Wright Corporation, which still exists today.
