IBM, Novell, Philips, Red Hat and Sony have formed a consortium to register and buy patents for free use by the open source community. 

The Open Invention Network will buy existing patents and register new ones for use in the development of new applications for Linux. 

"We are not focused on income or profit generation with our patents, but on using them to promote a positive, fertile ecosystem for the Linux operating system and to drive innovation and choice into the marketplace," said Jerry Rosenthal, chief executive at Open Invention Network.

"We intend to spur innovation in IT and across industries by helping software developers focus on what they do best: developing great Linux-related software with greater assurance about intellectual property issues."

Patents owned by the group will be available on a royalty-free basis to any company, institution or individual that agrees not to assert its patents against Linux or certain Linux-related applications.

It is not known at this stage how much funding the new organisation will receive but among its initial patent holdings is a set of business-to-business e-commerce patents purchased from Commerce One by JGR, a subsidiary of Novell.