Institute News – Max Planck Institute for Innovation and Competition

Attendants of the Munich Summer Institute 2022 in the in Grand Hall at the Max Planck Institute for Innovation and Competition, Munich

Event Report | 07/08/2022

Munich Summer Institute 2022 – Finally Back in Presence!

For the first time since the outbreak of the Covid-19 pandemic, the Munich Summer Institute took place again as an in-person event from 8 to 10 June 2022. After more than two years of countless virtual meetings, the organizers were particularly pleased to welcome the MSI community back live in Munich. 120 attendants experienced three days of interdisciplinary research with three keynote lectures, 17 full paper presentations as well as 34 poster slam presentations.

On day one, keynote speaker Hanna Halaburda (NYU) refreshingly discussed whether bitcoin can help us go green. The paper and poster presentations on that day focused on topics relating to “Privacy & Information”, “Digitization, Strategy & Organization”, “Media”, and “Market Dynamics”.

The second day initially dealt with the topics “Startups”, the “Gender Gap”, and “Entrepreneurship & Innovation”. The keynote speech was given by Nicola Lacetera (University of Toronto) on “Trust and Social Support: Rethinking the Economics of Innovation in the Age of AI”. Then the participants turned their attention to the areas of “Information” and “Labor”.

Day three first offered insights into “Incentives” and then dealt with the paradox of privacy regulation. Melissa Wassermann (University of Texas Austin) spoke in her keynote about investing in ex ante regulation drawing on evidence from pharmaceutical patent examination. The last poster slam centered around IP from a legal and economics perspective, innovation and digitalization. The MSI 2022 ended with presentations on platform regulation and drug patents.

Since its beginning back in 2016, the Munich Summer Institute has aimed to facilitate networking within an international and interdisciplinary research community. Accordingly, the conference was organized jointly by ETH Zurich’s Center for Law & Economics (Stefan Bechtold), the Max Planck Institute for Innovation and Competition (Dietmar Harhoff), the Chairs for Technology and Innovation Management and Economics of Innovation at TUM (Joachim Henkel and Hanna Hottenrott), as well as the ISTO at LMU (Jörg Claussen and Tobias Kretschmer).

We would like to thank all our speakers, discussants and attendants for a truly outstanding MSI conference 2022. We look forward to next years’ Munich Summer Institute 2023, which will take place from 24 to 26 May 2023!

You can find the the full MSI program 2022 here.

People | 07/06/2022

We mourn the passing of our colleague and friend Zdenko Caganic (1968 – 2022)

It is with great sadness and dismay that we had to learn that our colleague and friend of many years Zdenko Caganic passed away on 5 July 2022. We are all deeply shocked by his death.

Quite suddenly and without any warning, he suffered a cardiac arrest on the sidelines of a business trip. Immediate help given to him by companions and emergency doctors were of no avail.

Mr Caganic had been part of the core team of our institutes^♦ for more than 20 years. With passion, wisdom and wit, he championed the interests of us all. He was appreciated and well-liked, approachable for everyone and a constant support for his colleagues in the house services. We all relied on his help on countless occasions.

Our special sympathy goes to his family, especially to his wife Jakica Caganic, who has also been a valued member of our staff for many years. The Caganic couple was an integral part of our “Max Planck family” for a long time. We are sure that the entire staff will stand by Mrs Caganic in this difficult time.

For now, we have nothing left but to mourn Mr Caganic and grieve with his family.

^♦Max Planck Institute for Innovation and Competition and Max Planck Institute for Tax Law and Public Finance, as well as the predecessor institutes.

Josef Drexl during his opening lecture at the launch of the Max Planck Partner Group Senegal. (Photo: Université Virtuelle du Senegal)

Event Report | 04/05/2022

Official Opening Event of the Max Planck Partner Group in Senegal

On 16 and 17 March 2022, the inaugural event for the formation of the Max Planck Partner Group at the Université Virtuelle du Sénégal, or UVS of the Max Planck Partner Group with the Université Virtuelle du Sénégal, or UVS, took place in Dakar, Senegal. To launch its scientific activities, the research group held a kick-off workshop on “Access, Data Sharing and Sustainable Development Goals: An Overview from the Senegal's Point of View.”

At the opening ceremony before the workshop, Josef Drexl, Director at the Max Planck Institute for Innovation and Competition, gave a lecture on "Marchés numériques, droit de la concurrence et développement éconmique" (Digital markets, antitrust law and economic development). The event was streamed live on the YouTube platform and is still available there.

With the foundation of the research group, UVS hopes that its own strategic orientation will be strengthened and that the first project is only the beginning of a long partnership between the two institutions, as UVS wrote on Twitter.

With the project "Access, Data Sharing and Sustainable Development Goals: Regulation of the Data Economy in Emerging Economies," the institute will work with partners from emerging economies to develop advice on designing the optimal regulatory framework for data sharing to promote sustainable development in countries in the global South. In addition to UVS, research partners include universities in India and Brazil.

3rd SIPLA Conference, 03/16/2022, Buenos Aires, Argentina

Event Report | 03/23/2022

Third SIPLA Annual Conference: Innovation as a Key Component for Sustainable Development

How can innovation impact the solution of fundamental challenges facing humanity - climate change, food and the health of the world's population? Do new technologies make a strategic contribution to sustainable development - and where do the potentials of Latin America come in? These were the questions addressed by participants at the third annual meeting of the Institute's Smart IP in Latin America (SIPLA) research initiative, held on 16 March in Buenos Aires.

Since Latin American countries have significant potential for innovation in sustainable technologies thanks to certain resources, the focus of the conference was on the specific incentives that can drive relevant innovation in the region. Reto Hilty, Director at the Institute, and Diego Hurtado, Secretary of State at the Ministry of Science, Technology and Innovation, opened the event.

The debate included three panels: one with representatives of various Latin American start-ups, one with experts from the economic sciences, and one with legal scholars. The scientific panels used different, complementary approaches to discuss the questions of how to promote innovation in the field of sustainable technologies.

The first panel focused on the areas in which the invited start-ups from six Latin American countries are particularly innovative. Also addressed were the legal and economic difficulties faced by founders, as well as established companies. Moreover the panel examined the extent to which government or other support was decisive and thus contributed to economic growth.

The economic panel dealt with the question of how incentives can be created or increased in order to innovate in the areas of sustainability-oriented technologies. The economists also considered which factors have a positive or negative impact on the willingness of private actors to invest and what conclusions can be drawn from this in regulatory terms.

In the third panel, legal scholars addressed the legal framework conditions that can represent not only incentives but also constraints to sustainable development. They also highlighted the complexity of these frameworks and addressed the difficulties start-ups face in complying with them.

The enormous interest this topic attracts was also reflected in the number of participants: nearly 1,000 people attended the hybrid conference, according to the Argentine Ministry of Science, Technology and Innovation. The ministry acted as co-organizer and provided also the venue for this conference.

SIPLA - Smart IP for Latin Armerica

Otto-Hahn-Medaille, Felix Poege, Daria Kim

Award | 03/18/2022

Two Otto Hahn Medals for Young Researchers of the Institute

Dr. Daria Kim and Dr. Felix Pöge, researchers at the Max Planck Institute for Innovation and Competition who both completed their doctoral theses in 2021, have been awarded the Otto Hahn Medal by the Max Planck Society in recognition of their outstanding scientific achievements.

The Legal Scholar Daria Kim

The legal scholar Daria Kim receives the award for her work on “Access to Non-Summary Clinical Trial Data for Research Purposes Under EU Law”, a study on the regulation of access to data collected during clinical trials in order to improve future drug research.

Daria Kim provides in her dissertation an in-depth study on the regulation of access to patient-level data generated in the context of clinical trials. As an interdisciplinary study, it integrates the insights from medical research, economics and public policy into normative legal analysis. The author elaborates a proposal of how the rules on access to data can be designed on the EU level to reconcile the policy objectives of leveraging the knowledge potential of data through exploratory analysis in the interest of society at large while protecting innovation incentives of research-based drug companies. She thereby substantially contributes to the further development of the legal system designed to promote innovation against the backdrop of the current development of digitization.

Daria Kim is now a Senior Research Fellow at the Institute.

The Economist Felix Pöge

The economist Felix Pöge is awarded for his dissertation on “Corporate Innovation – The Role of Scientific Discoveries, Taxation and Antitrust” which makes important contributions to the analysis of innovation processes, in particular the impact of competition on innovation outcomes.

In four essays, Felix Pöge answers pressing research questions and examines how the quality of scientific contributions, corporate taxation, corporate participation in scientific conferences, and industry structure affect innovation outcomes. In his most comprehensive essay, he looks at the breakup of IG Farben after World War II and its impact on competition and innovation in the chemical sector. Pöge concludes that the politically motivated breakup led to a substantial increase in competition, which was reflected in lower prices for a large number of chemical products and in an increase in patenting activities by the companies affected by the breakup. For the current debate on the effects of mergers on competition and innovation, this historical study provides important evidence and implies that mergers can harm both competition and innovation.

Felix Pöge is now a Postdoctoral Associate at the Technology & Policy Research Initiative at Boston University.

The Max Planck Society has been awarding the prize for outstanding scientific achievements, named after the „father of nuclear chemistry” Otto Emil Hahn (1879–1968), since 1978. The prize is endowed with 7,500 euros and is intended to motivate young talented scientists to pursue a research career.

The Otto Hahn Medal for Young Scientists will be presented at the Annual Meeting of the Max Planck Society on 22 June 2022 in Berlin.

We congratulate the award winners!

Access to Non-Summary Clinical Trial Data for Research Purposes Under EU Law (pdf and epub)

Corporate Innovation – The Role of Scientific Discoveries, Taxation and Antitrust (pdf)

Institute Building in colors of Ukranine flag.

Miscellaneous | 03/09/2022

The Max Planck Institute for Innovation and Competition Is Committed to Support Ukrainian Researchers

Both the legal and economic departments of the Max Planck Institute for Innovation and Competition offer to support Ukrainian researchers fleeing from war in their home country. We also invite Ukrainian researchers to turn to us whose stipend or employment abroad ended recently and who are now looking for a way to continue their research outside Ukraine. The Institute provides office space, access to the library, a stipend for at least six months (extendable), and support for searching accommodation.

Scholars with a background or interest in Competition Law, Intellectual Property Law, Innovation Economics or Entrepreneurship Research should reach out to scienceforukraine(at)ip.mpg.de. This applies to doctoral students and established scientists alike.

Update from 4 May 2022

Since the publication of this information, numerous applications have been submitted. So far, eight scientists have been welcomed to the Institute. Two people are now conducting research in the department of Reto M. Hilty, and three each in the department of Josef Drexl and the department of Dietmar Harhoff. In addition to integration at the Institute, team members have helped with interpreting, finding a kindergarten place, organizing school places, and finding housing for the researchers and their relatives. In total, seven relatives, including five children, accompany the refugees. To strengthen contacts with and among the new colleagues, excursions were organized and the guests were even invited privately to an Easter brunch. All of this cannot make the cruel war in Ukraine forgotten, but hopefully it will make it a little easier for the newly arrived to settle into their new environment.

Prof. Dr. Dr. h.c. Reto M. Hilty (left) with the Colombian Superintendent for Industry and Commerce, Andrés Barreto González.

Miscellaneous | 03/04/2022

Smart IP for Latin America: Further agreement signed as part of the initiative

On 16 February 2022, Reto M. Hilty signed an agreement with the Colombian Superintendent for Industry and Commerce Andrés Barreto González. The aim is to jointly work on studies and workshops in the field of intellectual property and competition law.

As a result of the cooperation between the Institute's SIPLA initiative and the Colombian Superintendencia de Industria y Comercio (Superintendence of Industry and Commerce), both partners expect that research results from collaboratively identified projects will help to define governmental measures in a targeted manner and to implement them more efficiently.

A similar partnership has already been established with Argentina, and further agreements of this kind in Latin American countries are to follow in the future.

About SIPLA

Smart IP for Latin America is a research initiative of the Max Planck Institute for Innovation and Competition. It provides a neutral forum for academic and legal policy discourse on intellectual property and competition law in Latin America. It aims to inform and advise academia, policymakers, the business sector and the public on the basis of impartial and evidence-based fundamental research. The goal is to support the realization of Latin America’s social, cultural, and economic potential.

Smart IP for Latin America was launched in 2018 at an inaugural conference in Santiago de Chile, attended by representatives from academia, government, industry, and legal practice. An office at the University of Buenos Aires – the “Observatory” – has been coordinating research activities and events on site in close cooperation with the SIPLA team at the Institute in Munich since 2019. The team is supported by a top-class advisory board with scientific representatives from all over Latin America.

Miscellaneous | 02/21/2022

Call for Papers – Florence Seminar on Standard Essential Patents

The Max Planck Institute for Innovation and Competition and the European University Institute invite submissions to their scientific seminar on “Standard-Essential Patents” to be held in Florence at the EUI premises on 6-7 October 2022. The Seminar takes place within the Florence Competition Programme and the ongoing project Innovation and Intellectual Property in the Digital Age. Paper submission is open to submit an extended abstract or full papers until 31 May 2022.

Call For Unpublished Papers on the Licensing and Litigation of SEPs

The digital economy relies on information communication technology (ICT) standards to meet consumers’ demand for interoperability, connectivity and innovation. The diffusion of global standards such as 5G, Wi-Fi 6 and HEVC drives economic growth and prosperity by enabling the Internet of Things and the Fourth Industrial Revolution. However, as ICT standards become general-purpose technologies, tensions arise regarding licensing patents declared as essential for their implementation (i.e., standard-essential patents, SEPs).

Under the Fair, Reasonable and Non-Discriminatory (FRAND) licensing commitments before standard-development organisations (SDOs), SEP-holders seek remuneration from SEP implementers, which these latter sometimes resist. Against this background, the Florence Seminar on SEPs welcomes unpublished papers from lawyers and economists on the licensing and litigation of SEPs. The selected contributions will be discussed in-depth during the two-day Seminar, emphasising the societal impact of the research findings.

Suggested areas comprise:

FRAND royalty rate calculation (e.g., transparency, entire-market value rule vs smallest saleable patent practising unit, how to set a FRAND royalty rate in new IoT verticals);
Multi-party SEP licensing solutions (e.g., cross-licensing, patent pools, defensive patent aggregators and licensing-negotiation groups);
Patent exhaustion and FRAND licensing across IoT verticals;
SEP infringement and remedies;
Jurisdictional issues of SEP disputes (e.g., applicable law, anti-suit injunctions, national judgments on global FRAND licenses);
FRAND alternative dispute resolution mechanisms;
Market definition and market power vis-à-vis SEPs;
Unilateral and multilateral antitrust issues of SEP licensing and litigation.

Scientific committee:

Marco Botta | EUI
Ginevra Bruzzone | LUISS
Beatriz Conde Gallego | Max Planck Institute for Innovation and Competition
Josef Drexl | Max Planck Institute for Innovation and Competition
Lapo Filistrucchi | EUI – University of Florence
Igor Nikolic | EUI
Pier Luigi Parcu | EUI
Nicolas Petit | EUI
Maria Alessandra Rossi | University of Chieti Pescara

Organising committee:

Chiara Carrozza | EUI
Niccolò Galli | EUI

Submission: Please submit extended abstracts or full papers by 31 May 2022. Acceptance notiﬁcations will be sent by mid-June 2022. Final paper versions of the selected submissions are due by 18 September 2022.

Abstract Submission

Miscellaneous | 02/01/2022

Call for Papers – Munich Summer Institute 2022

The 6^th Munich Summer Institute, jointly organized with ETH Zurich, TUM and LMU, will take place from 8 to 10 June 2022. Researchers who would like to present a paper are invited to submit it online until 15 March 2022. This year, the Munich Summer Institute will be preceded by a doctoral workshop on 7 June 2022.

From 8 to 10 June 2022, the Center for Law & Economics at ETH Zurich, the Chair for Technology and Innovation Management at TUM, the Chair for Economics of Innovation at TUM, the Institute for Strategy, Technology and Organization at LMU Munich and the Max Planck Institute for Innovation and Competition will jointly organize the sixth Munich Summer Institute.

We plan to hold the Munich Summer Institute 2022 as an in-person event (no hybrid meeting) in Munich. If the Covid19 pandemic makes such physical meeting unfeasible, we will shift to an online event on the same days. This year, the Munich Summer Institute will be preceded by a doctoral workshop on 7 June.

The Summer Institute will focus on three areas:

Digitalization, Strategy and Organization
(chairs: Jörg Claussen and Tobias Kretschmer),
Innovation and Entrepreneurship
(chairs: Dietmar Harhoff, Joachim Henkel and Hanna Hottenrott), and
Law & Economics of Intellectual Property, Innovation & Digitalization
(chair: Stefan Bechtold).

The goal of the Munich Summer Institute is to stimulate a rigorous in-depth discussion of a select number of research papers and to strengthen the interdisciplinary international research community in these areas. Researchers in economics, law, management and related fields at all stages of their career (from Ph.D. students to full professors) may attend the Munich Summer Institute as presenters in a plenary or a poster session, as discussants or as attendants. The Munich Summer Institute will feature three keynote lectures, 12 plenary presentations and a daily poster session (including a poster slam). The Munich Summer Institute focuses on quantitative empirical research. Participation in the Munich Summer Institute is by invitation only.

Keynote speakers are:

Paper submission procedure

Researchers who would like to present a paper are invited to submit their paper online until 15 March 2022. The Munich Summer Institute only considers papers which have not been published or accepted for publication at the date of submission. Paper selections will be announced in mid-April 2022. The program of the Munich Summer Institute will be available in early May 2022. Final papers will be made available to conference participants on a public website, and are due on 15 May 2022. Researchers who would like to attend the Munich Summer Institute without giving a presentation should contact one of the organizers by 15 May 2022.

Further information

More information is available at the MSI website. Any questions concerning the Munich Summer Institute should be directed to Stefan Bechtold, Jörg Claussen, Dietmar Harhoff, Joachim Henkel, Hanna Hottenrott or Tobias Kretschmer.

People | 02/01/2022

Assistant Professorship at the University of Groningen for Marco Kleine

Marco Kleine, Senior Research Fellow at the Max Planck Institute for Innovation and Competition since 2014, joined the Faculty of Economics of the University of Groningen as Assistant Professor (tenure track) on 1 February 2022. His research and teaching focus on behavioral foundations of innovation and strategy.

His main research areas are Organization and Innovation, Innovation Research, Strategic Management and Behavioral and Experimental Economics.

Marco Kleine has been working as a Senior Research Fellow at the Max Planck Institute for Innovation and Competition in the Department Innovation and Entrepreneurship Research headed by Dietmar Harhoff. He played a major role in the successful establishment and operation of econlab (Max Planck Laboratory for Experimental Research in the Social Sciences). In 2018/19, he served as an interim Professor of Strategic Management at the Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität (LMU) Munich.

Marco Kleine has published his research results in renowned international journals such as the Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization and Research Policy. Currently, he is working on the role of user anonymity in organizational exchange platforms and the influence of innovation vouchers on the innovation performance of small and medium-sized enterprises.

His activities at the University of Groningen include research and teaching in the fields of innovation and strategy. He continues to be closely associated with the Max Planck Institute for Innovation and Competition as an Affiliated Research Fellow.