Patents and Cumulative Innovation: Causal Evidence from the Courts

• 成果类型: Article
• 署名作者: Galasso, Alberto; Schankerman, Mark
• 署名单位: University of Toronto; University of London; London School Economics & Political Science
• 刊物名称: QUARTERLY JOURNAL OF ECONOMICS
• ISSN/ISSBN: 0033-5533
• DOI: 10.1093/qje/qju029
• 发表日期: 2015
• 页码: 317-369
• 关键词: intellectual property-rights; child protection; POLICY; MARKET; TECHNOLOGY; assignment; strategies; IMPACT

摘要

Cumulative innovation is central to economic growth. Do patent rights facilitate or impede follow-on innovation? We study the causal effect of removing patent rights by court invalidation on subsequent research related to the focal patent, as measured by later citations. We exploit random allocation of judges at the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit to control for endogeneity of patent invalidation. Patent invalidation leads to a 50% increase in citations to the focal patent, on average, but the impact is heterogeneous and depends on characteristics of the bargaining environment. Patent rights block downstream innovation in computers, electronics, and medical instruments, but not in drugs, chemicals, or mechanical technologies. Moreover, the effect is entirely driven by invalidation of patents owned by large patentees that triggers more follow-on innovation by small firms. JEL Codes: K41, L24, O31, O33, O34.