网友在博文《通信领域专利不光看数量更要看质量》中提问——如何定义“Essential Patent”。

       如何定义“Essential Patent”不是我能够作到的，国际上早就有统一的认识如2001年美国麻省理工（MIT）出版的《创新政策和经济》第一卷中（”Innovation Policy and the Economy”）中加州伯克利大学的Carl Shapiro的文章《专利导航：交叉许可，专利池，标准设定》中就对 “Essential Patent”定义为：

   “An essential patent is a patent which discloses and claims one or more inventions that are required to practice a given industry standard. [1] Standardisation bodies, therefore, often require members disclose and grant licenses to patents and pending patent applications that they own and that cover a standard that the body is developing. Failure to do so is a form of patent misuse.
  If standards bodies fail to get licenses to all patents that are essential to practicing a standard, then the owners of those unlicensed patents can often demand royalties from those who ultimately adopt the standards. This is what happened, for example, to the GIF and JPEG standards.”

   简单说“essential patent” 就是实现工业标准要求所必须的专利。