Remuneration of Employee’s Inventions
With a service invention, the inventor acquires a claim to appropriate remuneration. However, at this early stage it is often not yet foreseeable whether and how the invention can be commercially exploited. It is therefore assumed that the claim for remuneration initially arises only on the merits.
The amount of the remuneration depends on various factors. It must be reasonable. To better understand the meaning of the term „reasonable“, there are official remuneration guidelines for employee’s inventions. They are not binding, but enjoy a high level of acceptance. The guidelines are divided into three parts: determination of the invention value, determination of the employee’s share factor in the invention, and the mathematical determination of the remuneration.