The Financial Crisis At The Origin of New Patent Opportunities?

An article in Zee News (link) explores the "theory" that new opportunities may appear for Small and Medium Enterprises (SME) because of the current financial crisis.

The rationale behind is that because companies are going to cut in their expenses, Intellectual Property Rights are going to directly suffer. More precisely, patent renewal fees would be the first victims of the "cost-cutting exercise".

I personally do not believe that this theory will be observed at a large scale for many reasons. I believe that companies should definitely takes this "opportunity" to do the cost-cutting exercise, but that this exercise should be done very carefully. While some jurisdictions offer opportunities to revive a patent once it becomes abandoned, those opportunities do not exist in many jurisdictions and the Rembrandt may end up in a garbage truck because of a too quick decision.