 Field-of-use restrictions in licensing agreementsInternational Journal of Industrial Organization, 2012, vol. 30, issue 5, 403-416 Abstract: A widely used clause in license contracts – the field-of-use restriction (FOUR) – precludes licensees from operating outside of the technical field specified. When a technology has several distinct applications, FOUR allow the licensor to divide up his rights and attribute them to the lowest-cost producer in each field of use. This can improve production efficiency. With complex technologies, however, the boundaries of fields of use may be difficult to codify, entailing a risk of licensees' rights overlapping. We explore how this affects the optimal license contract in a moral hazard framework where the licensor's effort determines the probability of overlap. We show that depending on the contracting environment, the license agreement may include output restrictions and non‐linear royalty schemes. Keywords: Licensing; Usage restrictions; Overlap; Royalties (search for similar items in EconPapers) Downloads: (external link) Related works: Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:indorg:v:30:y:2012:i:5:p:403-416 DOI: 10.1016/j.ijindorg.2012.05.001 Access Statistics for this article International Journal of Industrial Organization is currently edited by P. Bajari, B. Caillaud and N. Gandal More articles in International Journal of Industrial Organization from Elsevier |
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