In fact, open research can also be protected. So we should be careful with definitions. Open research is collaborative research in which you make intellectual property available to partners. So there can also be patents in open research.
That said, it’s not limited to patents. I was just talking about third-party open intellectual property. We’ve seen several successful cases of technology transfer where the intellectual property wasn’t through patents, but through copyrights on code or other kinds of intellectual property.
That’s why patents are not an end in themselves for intellectual property, especially in information technology.