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on Intellectual Property Rights |
| By: | Tamara Hafner; David Popp |
| Abstract: | As countries reform their patent laws to be in compliance with the Trade Related Intellectual Property Rights Agreement, an important question is how increased patent protection will affect drug prices in low-income countries. Using pharmaceutical trade data from 1996 to 2005, we examine the role of China and India as suppliers of medicines to other middle- and low-income countries and evaluate the competitive effect of medicine imports from these countries on the price of medicines from high- income countries. We find that imports of antibiotics and unspecified medicaments from India and China significantly depress the average price of these commodities imported from high-income trading partners, suggesting that India and China are not only important sources of inexpensive medicines but also have an indirect effect by lowering prices through competition. As India is the leading supplier of medicines in Sub-Saharan Africa, this region will likely be affected most adversely. |
| JEL: | I10 O10 O34 |
| Date: | 2011–07 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:nbr:nberwo:17249&r=ipr |
| By: | Naghavi, Alireza (University of Bologna); Strozzi, Chiara (University of Modena and Reggio Emilia) |
| Abstract: | In this paper we study theoretically and empirically the role of the interaction between skilled migration and intellectual property rights (IPRs) protection in determining innovation in developing countries (South). We show that although emigration from the South may directly result in the well-known concept of brain drain, it also causes a brain gain effect, the extent of which depends on the level of IPRs protection in the sending country. We argue this to come from a diaspora channel through which the knowledge acquired by emigrants abroad can flow back to the South and enhance the skills of the remaining workers there. By increasing the size of the innovation sector and the skill-intensity of emigration, IPRs protection makes it more likely for diaspora gains to dominate, thus facilitating a potential net brain gain. Our main theoretical insights are then tested empirically using a panel dataset of emerging and developing countries. The findings reveal a positive correlation between emigration and innovation in the presence of strong IPRs protection. |
| Keywords: | intellectual property rights, migration, technology transfer, brain gain, diaspora |
| JEL: | O34 F22 O33 J24 J61 |
| Date: | 2011–07 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iza:izadps:dp5864&r=ipr |
| By: | Malwina Mejer |
| Abstract: | Intensification of university-industry interactions raises concerns about the potential negative impact it may have on the pace of scientific progress. This paper analyzes the relationship between academic patenting, research collaboration and quality of scientic output in a panel of 268 patenting and non-patenting life-science researchers from five universities in Belgium. Results suggest that scientists benefit from research collaboration with industry as witnessed by higher productivity and higher annual citation frequencies. Patenting positively correlates with higher quality of scientific output, except when industry is directly involved in the patenting process. In contrast to previous studies we do not end a positive relationship between patenting and citations. |
| Keywords: | patenting; scientific publication; quality; collaboration |
| JEL: | I21 I23 O33 O34 |
| Date: | 2011–07 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:eca:wpaper:2013/93568&r=ipr |
| By: | Ashish Arora; Lee G. Branstetter; Matej Drev |
| Abstract: | This paper documents a shift in the nature of innovation in the information technology (IT) industry. Using comprehensive data on all IT patents granted by the USPTO from 1983-2004, we find strong evidence of a change in IT innovation that is systematic, substantial, and increasingly dependent on software. This change in the nature of IT innovation has had differential effects on the performance of the IT industries in the United States and Japan. Using a broad unbalanced panel of US and Japanese publicly listed IT firms in the period 1983-2004, we show that (a) Japanese IT innovation relies less on software advances than US IT innovation, (b) the innovation performance of Japanese IT firms is increasingly lagging behind that of their US counterparts, particularly in IT sectors that are more software intensive, and (c) that US IT firms are increasingly outperforming their Japanese counterparts, particularly in more software intensive sectors. The findings of this paper thus provide a fresh explanation for the relative decline of the Japanese IT industry in the 1990s. Finally, we provide suggestive evidence consistent with the hypothesis that human resource constraints played a role in preventing Japanese firms from adapting to the shift in the nature of innovation in IT. |
| Keywords: | Innovation, Technological change, IT industry, Software innovation, Japan |
| Date: | 2011–08 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hst:ghsdps:gd11-199&r=ipr |
| By: | Russell Thomson (Melbourne Institute of Applied Economic and Social Research, and Intellectual Property Research Institute of Australia (IPRIA), The University of Melbourne); Elizabeth Webster (Melbourne Institute of Applied Economic and Social Research, and Intellectual Property Research Institute of Australia (IPRIA), The University of Melbourne) |
| Abstract: | In this paper we consider why firms sometimes choose an external development path for their own inventions, despite the costs of contracting and the risks of opportunistic behaviour and expropriation. We model the probability that firms adopt an external development strategy using survey data from over 2700 Australian inventions. Our results indicate that firms pursue external development strategies in response to perceived project-level risk about the technical feasibility of the invention, especially when suported by confidence in the patent system. Our findings also confirm that small to medium size enterprises, highly leveraged large firms and firms with few co-specialized assets are more likely to pursue an external development strategy. |
| Keywords: | Outsourcing R&D, managing technological risk, licensing innovation |
| JEL: | O32 O33 |
| Date: | 2011–07 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iae:iaewps:wp2011n19&r=ipr |
| By: | Fidel Pérez Sebastián (Universidad de Alicante) |
| Abstract: | This paper searches for the determinants of government-funded R&D. The goal is to disentangle whether the efficiency considerations overwhelmingly emphasized by the theoretical literature are indeed the main driving force behind public R&D expenditures. Another goal of the paper is to assess whether other types of innovation policy such as the degree of patent protection can have an impact on private R&D. I find that there are important differences between rich and poor nations at this respect. In particular, R&D-specific efficiency factors are not significant to explain public R&D in rich nations, whereas related variables such as the access to private credit and knowledge spillovers are important in less developed economies; in rich countries, public innovation effort can be better explained by the political economy variables that determine the size of governments. Private R&D, on the other hand, depends in high income economies on R&D policies that try to improve R&D efficiency, but is highly determined by government size in less income nations. Results suggest that more research on political economy theories of innovation is essential to understand R&D investment. |
| Keywords: | R&D, policy, market failures, political factors |
| Date: | 2011–07 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ivi:wpasad:2011-17&r=ipr |