> The GPLv2, despite being silent with respect to patents, actually confers on its licensees more rights to a licensor’s patents than those licenses that purport to address the issue. This is the case because patent law, under the doctrine of implied license, gives to each distributee of a patented article a license from the distributor to practice any patent claims owned or held by the distributor that cover the distributed article. The implied license also extends to any patent claims owned or held by the distributor that cover “reasonably contemplated uses” of the patented article.
> The GPLv2, despite being silent with respect to patents, actually confers on its licensees more rights to a licensor’s patents than those licenses that purport to address the issue. This is the case because patent law, under the doctrine of implied license, gives to each distributee of a patented article a license from the distributor to practice any patent claims owned or held by the distributor that cover the distributed article. The implied license also extends to any patent claims owned or held by the distributor that cover “reasonably contemplated uses” of the patented article.