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on Intellectual Property Rights |
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Issue of 2017‒07‒02
four papers chosen by Giovanni Ramello Università degli Studi del Piemonte Orientale “Amedeo Avogadro” |
| By: | Comino, Stefano; Galasso, Alberto; Graziano, Clara |
| Abstract: | What factors affect the diffusion of new economic institutions? This paper examines this question exploiting the introduction of the first regularized patent system which appeared in the Venetian Republic in 1474. We begin by developing a model which links patenting activity of craft guilds with provisions in their statutes. The model predicts that guild statutes that are more effective at preventing outsider's entry and at mitigating price competition lead to less patenting. We test this prediction on a new dataset which combines detailed information on craft guilds and patents in the Venetian Republic during the Renaissance. We find a negative association between patenting activity and guild statutory norms which strongly restrict entry and price competition. We show that guilds which originated from medieval religious confraternities were more likely to regulate entry and competition, and that the effect on patenting is robust to instrumenting guild statutes with their quasi-exogenous religious origin. We also find that patenting was more widespread among guilds geographically distant from Venice, and among guilds in cities with lower political connection which we measure exploiting a new database on noble families and their marriages with members of the great council. Our analysis suggests that local economic and political conditions may have a substantial impact on the diffusion of new economic institutions. |
| Keywords: | Competition; Guilds; institutions; patents |
| JEL: | K23 O33 O34 |
| Date: | 2017–06 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cpr:ceprdp:12102&r=ipr |
| By: | Øystein Bieltvedt Skeie; Åsa Johansson; Carlo Menon; Stéphane Sorbe |
| Abstract: | This paper assesses the effect of international differences in taxes on the choice of patent location by multinational enterprises (MNEs). The analysis is based on a large sample of patents and firms from the OECD-PATSTAT and OECD-ORBIS databases over 2004-10. The approach is to compare the number of patent applications of MNE entities with different links to other countries and thus different sets of location choices, while controlling for other factors affecting patenting behaviour. The results suggest that lower corporate taxes, either in the form of a lower statutory rate or a preferential intellectual property regime, are associated with more patent applications. Both the location of research activities, which is proxied by the location of patent inventors, and the legal ownership of patents are found to be sensitive to corporate taxes. For instance, a 5 percentage point cut in the preferential tax rate on patent income is associated with a 6% increase in patent applications. On average, about two-thirds of the increase comes from patents invented at home and one third from patents invented abroad, but the relative importance of these two effects is likely to vary with the design of the preferential regime and especially the existence of activity requirements. In addition, strong anti-avoidance measures against tax planning are found to reduce patent shifting by MNEs. Innovation, localisation des brevets et planification fiscale des multinationales Cet article évalue l'effet des différences internationales d’imposition sur le choix de l'emplacement des brevets par les entreprises multinationales. L'analyse est basée sur un large échantillon de brevets et d’entreprises des bases de données OCDE-PATSTAT et OCDE-ORBIS sur 2004-10. L'approche consiste à comparer le nombre de demandes de brevets d'entités de multinationales ayant différents liens vers d'autres pays et donc différents ensembles de choix de localisation, tout en contrôlant pour les autres facteurs qui influent sur le comportement en matière de brevets. Les résultats suggèrent qu’un niveau plus faible d’impôt sur les sociétés, soit sous la forme d'un taux légal inférieur soit d’un régime de propriété intellectuelle préférentiel, est associé à davantage de demandes de brevets. Tant la localisation des activités de recherche, qui est approchée par le lieu de résidence des inventeurs de brevets, que la propriété juridique des brevets seraient sensibles à l'impôt sur les sociétés. Par exemple, une baisse de 5 points de pourcentage du taux d'imposition préférentiel sur le revenu de brevet est associée à une augmentation de 6% des demandes de brevet. En moyenne, environ deux tiers de l'augmentation provient de brevets inventés dans le pays en question et un tiers des brevets inventés à l'étranger, mais l'importance relative de ces deux effets est susceptible de varier en fonction de la conception du régime préférentiel et plus particulièrement de l'existence d'exigences de localisation d’activité. En outre, de fortes mesures anti-évitement contre la planification fiscale réduiraient selon les estimations de l’article les transferts de brevets par les multinationales. |
| Keywords: | BEPS, corporate taxation, multinational enterprises, patents, research and development, tax planning |
| JEL: | F23 H26 O34 |
| Date: | 2017–02–16 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:oec:ecoaaa:1360-en&r=ipr |
| By: | Dietl, Marek; Skrok, Å ukasz; Benalcazar, Pablo; GÄ…tkowski, Mateusz; Rockett, Katharine |
| Abstract: | This article empirically investigates the results of an expert-based method to identify ‘patent thickets’ for a unique USPTO dataset. The research aims to identify the overall effect of patent thickets on patent pendency. We find that patents belonging to a thicket are, on average, granted protection sooner. At the same time, we show that patent groups with higher thicket frequency have higher average pendency time, as do patents within larger thickets. Both suggest spillovers in processing time across patents. We additionally find mild support that the first patent in a thicket has a longer pendency period. |
| Date: | 2017 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:esx:essedp:19979&r=ipr |
| By: | Dai, Shuanping; Yang, Guanzhong |
| Abstract: | Open innovation has attracted an avalanche of interests from many practitioners and scholars, and is gradually becoming an acceptable scientific and managerial paradigm over the past few decades. Traditionally, however, innovative activities ought to be confidential within certain groups or individuals before the marketing process, and will be protected strictly by the intellectual property rights laws, for the sake of innovators' economic benefits and encouraging further innovation attempts. This paper aims at addressing the question of how to stimulate firms and managers to invest more resources to open innovation, and focuses on social inducement's effectiveness, in the art of a pre-recorded video, using an experimental approach. We established two open innovation investment models in which investors decide to allocate resources to open and traditional innovation projects. In the first model, we introduce the spillover effect and assume that traditional innovation projects may profit from open innovation investment. We then consider uncertainty to make the investment more realistic in the second model. The effect of social inducement on open innovation provision has been investigated in all the three settings, i. e. No Video, Full Video and Half Video. The striking result is that social inducement increases open innovation investment, but only if both induced subjects and non-induced subjects exist; meanwhile, economic uncertainty also matters. |
| Keywords: | open innovation,social inducement,conditional cooperation,economic uncertainty |
| JEL: | C92 H41 O31 |
| Date: | 2017 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:zbw:udedao:1122017&r=ipr |