US universities have entire departments devoted to technology licensing. The default to secrecy may be an artifact of their historic reliance on defense agency funding for technical projects and the bureaucratic staffing for paperwork heavy processes.<p>On the other hand, there&#x27;s an intellectual idea that for many companies, existing software should perhaps be seen as a liability in double entry accounting due to it&#x27;s need for ongoing maintenance, upgrades, potential for catastrophic failure, and the cost associated with alterations for new business processes.<p>Companies offload some of those costs by open sourcing and allowing developers to happily &quot;give back&quot; to their bottom line.