On May 30, 2017, the Supreme Court held that the initial authorized sale of a patented item within or outside the U.S. “exhausts” all rights of the patentee to that item under the Patent Act. This decision goes against the Government's position that a foreign sale authorized by the U.S....

This paper investigates the role of patent protection in the global investment decisions of multinational firms. Using comprehensive firm-level panel data of German multinationals, we investigate how changes in a host country’s patent protection influence the extensive and intensive margin of...