Forty signs of rain - Kim Stanley Robinson [29]
“I don’t work for Torrey Pines anymore.”
“No I know, but maybe you could rejoin us when you move back here.”
“Maybe. If you get new financing.”
“I’m trying, believe me. That’s why I’d like to have you back on board.”
“We’ll see. Let’s talk about it when I’m out there. Meanwhile, don’t cut any more of your other research efforts. They might be what draws the new financing.”
“I hope so. I’m doing what I can, believe me. We’re trying to hold on til something comes through.”
“Yeah. Hang in there then. I’ll be out looking for a place to live in a couple of weeks, I’ll come see you then.”
“Good, make an appointment with Susan.”
Frank clicked off his phone, sat back in his chair thinking it over. Derek was like a lot of first-generation CEOs of biotech start-ups. He had come out of the biology department at UCSD, and his business acumen had been gained on the job. Some people managed to do this successfully, others didn’t, but all tended to fall behind on the actual science being done, and had to take on faith what was really possible in the labs. Certainly Derek could use some help in guiding policy at Torrey Pines Generique.
Frank went back to studying the grant proposal. There were elements of the algorithm missing, as was typical. That was what the grant was for, to pay for the work that would finish the project. And some people made a habit of describing crucial aspects of their work in general terms when at the prepub stage, a matter of being cautious. So he could not be sure about it, but he could see the potential for a very powerful method there. Earlier in the day he had thought he saw a way to plug one of the gaps that Pierzinski had left, and if that worked as he thought it might…
“Hmmmm,” he said to the empty room.
If the situation was still fluid when he went out to San Diego, he could perhaps set things up quite nicely. There were some potential problems, of course. NSF’s guidelines stated explicitly that although any copyrights, patents, or project income belonged to the grant holder, NSF always kept a public-right use for all grant-subsidized work. That would keep any big gains from being made by an individual or company on a project like this, if it was awarded a grant. Purely private control could only be maintained if there had not been any public money granted.
Also, the P.I. on the proposal was Pierzinski’s advisor at Caltech, battening off the work of his students in the usual way. Of course it was an exchange—the advisor gave the student credibility, a sort of license to apply for a grant, by contributing his name and prestige to the project. The student provided the work, sometimes all of it, sometimes just a portion of it. In this case, it looked to Frank like all of it.
Anyway, the grant proposal came from Caltech. Caltech and the P.I. would hold the rights to anything the project made, along with NSF itself, even if Pierzinski moved afterward. So, if for instance an effort was going to be made to bring Pierzinski to Torrey Pines Generique, it would be best if this particular proposal were to fail. And if the algorithm worked and became patentable, then again, keeping control of what it made would only be possible if the proposal were to fail.
That line of thought made him feel jumpy. In fact he was on his feet, pacing out to the minibalcony and back in again. Then he remembered he had been planning to go out to Great Falls anyway. He quickly finished his cottage cheese, pulled his climbing kit out of the closet, changed clothes, and went back down to his car.
The Great Falls of the Potomac was a complicated thing, a long tumble of whitewater falling down past a few islands. The complexity of the falls was its main visual appeal, as it was no very great thing in terms of total height, or even volume of water. Its roar was the