fertility of an innovation in generating more innovations cannot be observed. The menu of patent scope can be implemented with …It may be advantageous to provide a variety of kinds of patent protection to heterogenous innovations. Innovations … protection in order to be encouraged. We model the problem of designing an optimal patent menu (scope and length) when the …

Does an expansion of patent scope induce more innovative effort by firms? This article provides evidence on this … question by examining firm responses to the Japanese patent reforms of 1988. Interviews with practitioners suggest the reforms … significantly expanded the scope of patent rights in Japan, but that the average response in terms of additional R&D effort and …

How do non-practicing entities ("Patent Trolls") impact innovation and technological progress? Although this question …", who exploit the patent system to extract rents and thereby hurt innovation. We employ unprecedented access to NPE …-derived patent and financial data, as well as a novel model that guides our data analysis. We find that NPEs acquire patents from …

. The purpose is to document the ways in which patent systems are products of battles over the economic surplus from … innovation. The features of these systems take shape as interests at different points in the production chain seek advantage in …-style patent systems with all their imperfections have come to dominate other methods of encouraging inventive activity. The essays …

Patent counts are very imperfect measures of innovative output. This paper discusses how additional data-the number of … years a patent is renewed and the number of countries in which protection for the same invention is sought - can be used to … improve on counts in studies which require a measure of the extent of innovation. A simple renewal based weighting scheme is …

Such institutions as patent systems cannot be well understood without an assessment of technological creativity in …. Accordingly, this paper offers an empirical comparison of patents in relation to the award of prizes for technological innovation … unpredictable, and was unrelated to such proxies for the productivity of the innovation as inventive capital or the commercial …

Do stronger intellectual property rights incentivize female participation in innovation? We provide new evidence on … innovation …

existence of strong patent laws encourage innovation? And 2) May patent laws influence the direction - as opposed to the rate …What is the optimal system of intellectual property rights to encourage innovation? Empirical evidence from economic … to address problems with the current patent system: 3) How do patent pools, as a mechanism to mitigate litigation risks …

This paper studies a simple model of experimentation and innovation. Our analysis suggests that patents may improve the … project to implement. A successful innovation can be copied by other firms. Symmetric equilibria (where actions do not depend … equilibria). In contrast to patents, subsidies to experimentation, research, or innovation cannot typically achieve this …

deadweight loss associated with the patent system and discourage innovation by others. Economic efficiency is promoted if rewards … the patent system designed to spur innovation by better aligning the rewards and contributions of patent holders … the social benefits of their innovations if innovation is to be suitably rewarded and encouraged. However, this paper …