Max-Planck-Institut für Innovation und Wettbewerb, München, Raum 313
To study how governments can improve the quality of patent screening, we develop an integrative framework incorporating four main policy instruments: patent office examination, pre- and post-grant fees, and challenges in the courts. We show that examination and pre-grant fees are complementary, and that pre-grant fees screen more e ectively than post-grant fees. Simulations of the model, calibrated on U.S. patent and litigation data, indicate that patenting is socially excessive and the patent oce does not e ectively weed out low-quality applications. We quantify the welfare effects of counterfactual policy reforms and show how they depend on the quality of the courts (co-authored with Mark Schankerman).
Ansprechpartner: Dr. Fabian Gaessler