On May 4, 2020, the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) unveiled a new web-based intellectual property marketplace platform, Patents 4 Partnerships, to provide the public with a user-friendly, searchable repository of patents and published patent applications related to the COVID-19 pandemic that are indicated as available for licensing.

The new platform will facilitate the voluntary licensing and commercialization of innovations in a variety of key technologies, and help disseminate valuable patent information. Patents 4 Partnerships may contribute toward this battle by helping to bring to the marketplace new products and technologies for the prevention, treatment, and diagnosis of COVID-19. In the future, the platform may be expanded to include other technologies.

Patents 4 Partnerships allows users to search and sort information in a variety of easy-to-use ways, including by keyword, inventor name, assignee and issue date. At launch, its contents have been drawn from a variety of public sources, including the USPTO, the Federal Laboratory Consortium for Technology Transfer (FLC Business), the AUTM Innovation Marketplace (AIM), universities, and a number of federal agencies, including the National Institutes of Health, the Department of Energy, the National Aeronautics and Space Administration, the Food and Drug Administration, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the Department of Defense and the Department of Veterans Affairs databases.