strategy leverages China's WTO TRIPs accession, which led to stronger intellectual property rights in 2002. We find a …

Low-quality patents are of considerable concern to businesses operating in patent-dense markets. There are two pathways … by which low-quality patents may be issued: the patent office may apply systematically a standard that is too lenient … (low inventive step threshold); or the patent office may grant patents that are, in fact, below its own threshold (so …

of the developing world introduces patent protection for new drug products. This may lead to more research on drugs to … those already offering such protection the situation offers a unique opportunity to examine the incentive role of patent … provides a baseline' against which future research activity can be compared once the new global patent regime is fully …

bodies and private firms. One little-explored empirical testing ground is the patent system. This paper examines the … administrative practices of patent offices in sixty countries over a 150-year period. I show that the usage of patent renewal fees … economies, and those where international trade is more important-incorporate discretionary features into their patent systems …

This paper surveys the major changes in patent policy and practice that have occurred in the last two decades in the U … effects of changes in patent policy. Despite the significance of the policy changes and the wide availability of detailed data … patent policy are few. Possible reasons for these limited results are discussed, and possible avenues for future research are …

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 … fertility of an innovation in generating more innovations cannot be observed. The menu of patent scope can be implemented with …

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 …

strengthening of US patent rights in the early 1980s. Yet the propensity of semiconductor firms to patent has risen dramatically … markets, while spawning patent portfolio races' among capital-intensive firms …

between highly similar patents, and patent applications are less likely to be abandoned post-AIPA, suggesting a reduction in … duplicative R&D. Firms exposed to one standard deviation longer patent grant delays increased their R&D investment by 4% after …

We estimate the effect of patent protection on follow-on investments in corporate scientific research. We exploit a new … method for identifying an exogenous reduction in the protection a granted patent provides. Using data on public, research …-active firms between 1990 and 2015, we find that firms decrease follow-on research after a reduction in patent protection, as …