Quote Originally Posted by Nessus View Post
Here's another one:

Let's say I, being funded by both Finnish tax payer and private agencies, utilizing tools mostly paid for by Finnish tax payer, am working with, oh, a Korean scientist and a Romanian* engineer, one funded by a private Korean fund and the other by the state of Romania, on a novel construction material which has been produced by a private Finnish industrial firm. Which nation, if any, should enjoy the fruits of our research and build new houses out of Obtanium? Which nation's tax payer should pay which for this research? Should the nations' tax payers pay the Finnish firm, or vice versa? Should any of the private funding agencies get anything related to Obtanium-research?

Does the situation change if said Finnish firm is partly owned by the Finnish government (tax payer)?

*Nations changed to protect privacy!
Good question.

I'd say most people today would think majority ownership belongs to the private Finnish industrial firm, as the producer. It's convenient that the Finn tax payers are also supplying most of the "tools" for the Finnish production company. That implies a cross-over of "ownership", and shared resources between a Finnish individual/corporation, and its government/tax payer citizens.

Assuming the private Finnish industrial firm has properly paid the other scientist and engineer as contractors, it can't be isolated who subsidized their expertise, or why their nationality matters much. (A private international benefactor or public nation-state.) The originating and publicly-funded producer Finns should probably give a tax break or huge consumer discount to fellow Finns, for their product. The contractors might have a legal agreement to get a royalty for sale of that product (paying either the person, their nation, or both).

At least, I think that sounds about how it might go. It would change as soon as patents or trademarks expired, but I don't know enough about how those international legal rules work.