This paper seeks to ascertain the role of intellectual property rights (IPR) on Zimbabwe’s maize output. Specific focus is given to the role of article 27 of the Trade Related Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS) agreement as well as the Convention of Biological Diversity (CBD) in influencing...

We evaluate the case for non-discrimination in the international protection of intellectual property. If trade is not subject to any frictions then requiring national treatment (NT) in patent protection does not have any consequences for innovation (and welfare) since unfavorable discrimination...

The economic value of upstream research outcomes has raised increasing attention. Not only are these outcomes central to the development of many innovations, but they are also the object of many transactions in technology. This note discusses a few representative papers that try to better...

We study how uncompensated research and development (R&D) spillovers – the leakage of proprietary information through imitation or theft – affect firms’ investment decisions. Using variation in property rights protections across different regions within China we find that (1) uncompensated...

I show that very complex inventions stay outside the patent system more often than medium-complexity products. I test this hypothesis using a subset of international patents data. The regressions confirm that patents and technological complexity have an inverted-U shape relation.

We develop a model in which stronger protection of intellectual property rights has an inverted U-shaped effect on innovation. Intellectual property rights protection allows the incumbent firms to capture part of the rents of commercial exploration that would otherwise accrue to the...

This paper analyzes rules for international factor movements, i.e. real capital flows together with the relocation of firms, the flow of technology and the migration of people. These rules have to make sure that individuals, individual countries as well as the world economy benefit from factor...

This paper assesses the relevance of intellectual property rights (IPRs) in the knowledge economy (KE)-finance nexus using the four variables identified under the World Bank's knowledge economy index (KEI) and seven financial intermediary dynamics of depth, efficiency, activity and size. Three...

Using a dynamic model of patent races for two sequential innovations, Scotchmer & Green (1990) compared the effect on R&D incentives of the two patent-issuing rules, first-to-invent and first-to-file, and found first-to-file more conducive to R&D. We show that their result depends on their...

This paper explores entrepreneurship in biotech through the in depth analysis of four new ventures located in the Upper-Rhine Biovalley. One of the strengths of this paper is the presence of both successful cases of entrepreneurship and of cases of failures. This gives the opportunity to discuss...