fulfill the responsibilities they have been assigned in fostering innovation. But I argue here that in their moments of … the door to a new examination of patent purposes, and to understanding some otherwise inexplicable characteristics of … patent law …

The literature on patent buyouts has focused on single-economy settings, where buyouts are welfare improving relative … world with two heterogeneous countries featuring different sizes and innovation capacities. Moving to an international … system of global patent protection paired with domestic price subsidies, and only intersovereign transfers can achieve a …

We investigate the causal effect of patent rights on cumulative innovation, using large-scale data that approximate the … patent universe in its technological and economic variety. We introduce a novel instrumental variable for patent invalidation … that exploits personnel scarcity in post-grant opposition at the European Patent Office. We find that patent invalidation …

Patent scope is one of the important aspects in the debates over “patent quality.” The purported decrease in patent …), decreased clarity, and questionable validity. Such patents allegedly diminish the incentives for innovation due to increased … licensing and litigation costs. However, these debates often occur without well-defined measurements of patent scope. This paper …

creation of lesser estates or restrictive covenants for real property. In sum, early American courts incorporated into patent … concepts of "assignments" and "licenses." Given widespread confusion today concerning patent conveyance doctrines, this chapter … economic parlance), but patent theorists today can draw at least two important lessons from it. First, it reveals how …

In this paper, we study the determinants of patent quality and volume of patent applications when inventors care about … perceived patent quality. We analyze the effects of various policy reforms, specifically, a proposal to establish a two …-tiered patent system. In the two-tiered system, applicants can choose between a regular patent and a more costly, possibly more …

the frontiers of knowledge. It is difficult, however, to obtain a patent for an invention which seems impossible … becomes possible? History reveals that the Patent Office and the courts will continue to deny patents for a long time …, prevents the patent system from sitting at the cutting edge of technology, and frustrates the patent system’s overarching goal …

We present a model of process innovation that offers an explanation for the negative relationship between patent … favor imitation. Since imitation is discouraged for strong levels of patent protection, we find that R&D investment is often … maximized for an intermediate protection level. In addition, an increase in patent protection can enhance the innovator …

A generic drug maker that has been sued for infringing a patent on a branded drug will sometimes promise, as part of an … agreement settling the litigation, to delay selling its drug until as late as the expiration of the patent term. I adapt the … standard optimal patent term model to determine whether the delay in competition caused by such agreements raises consumer …

Patent scope is one of the important aspects in the debates over “patent quality.” The purported decrease in patent …), decreased clarity, and questionable validity. Such patents allegedly diminish the incentives for innovation due to increased … licensing and litigation costs. However, these debates often occur without well-defined measurements of patent scope. This paper …