Ann: Chairman's Address to Shareholders , page-47

Kacy, I suggested giving away Pyke Hill and Bulman (if a buyer can't be found), just so the don't have to spend money on exploration (which they have to to keep the permit). They wouldn't do it.

There seems to be no market for 99.99% pure lithium, and besides, I believe their patent is only to produce lithium at 99.7% purity. They said that one of the major cash drains at Rincon was the patenting process as Argentina is not a signatory of unspecified patent treaties (they probably mean the WIPO treaty).

I suggested they could have just used trade secret and NDAs to protect the knowledge or not bother at all, as other lithium salt lakes might not even be able to use the process due to a different composition, but PT stated that there were 11 lithium lakes in China alone and that they could use it. They also didn't believe that they could protect it with trade secret and NDAs, because PT said that to get a contract, they'd have to show the buyers the entire process before they would buy.

I doubt this very much, and doubt the real value of the patent. It clearly isn't worth more than $36m, anyway, as it is bundled into the sale of RLL.