I guess I overstated the case. AFAIU the intent was for the government to push for commercialization of its inventions using exclusive and non-exclusive licensi

I guess I overstated the case. AFAIU the intent was for the government to push for commercialization of its inventions using exclusive and non-exclusive licensing agreements. See, e.g., https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/15/3710 https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/15/3710 (sister legislation to Bayh-Dole: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stevenson-Wydler_Technology_Innovation_Act_of_1980 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stevenson-Wydler_Technology_In...) https://www.doi.gov/techtransfer/patents https://www.doi.gov/techtransfer/patents https://www.nist.gov/tpo/incentives-inventors https://www.nist.gov/tpo/incentives-inventors https://www.energy.gov/sites/prod/files/2015/01/f19/LicensingGuideFINAL.pdf https://www.energy.gov/sites/prod/files/2015/01/f19/Licensin... But I couldn't find much evidence that this is common. In fact, this 2017 accounting of royalty payments to federal employee inventors suggests it's not common at all: https://www.whitehouse.gov/wp-content/uploads/2017/12/10-20-17-OSTP-Patent-Report.pdf https://www.whitehouse.gov/wp-content/uploads/2017/12/10-20-... Perhaps federal employee inventions are typically for basic research and don't lend themselves to direct commercialization. And while use of those basic science patents might be necessary for actual commercial products, nobody in the government is policing infringement--which is probably a good thing. By contrast, even when a federal contractor is doing basic research, they have more financial incentive to aggressively file patents and subsequently enforce them.