Screening for Patent Quality

Mark Schankerman and Florian Schuett

No 11688, CEPR Discussion Papers from Centre for Economic Policy Research

Abstract: 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 effectively 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 office does not effectively weed out low-quality applications. We use the calibrated model to quantify the welfare effects of various counterfactual policy reforms.

Keywords: Innovation; Patents; Screening; Litigation; Courts; Patent fees (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: D82 K41 L24 O31 O34 O38 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2016-12
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-ino, nep-ipr and nep-law
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (2)

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