Strategic uses of patents in markets for technology: A story of fabless firms, brokers and trolls

Julien Pénin ()
Additional contact information
Julien Pénin: BETA - Bureau d'Économie Théorique et Appliquée - INRA - Institut National de la Recherche Agronomique - UNISTRA - Université de Strasbourg - UL - Université de Lorraine - CNRS - Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique

Post-Print from HAL

Abstract: This paper analyses the strategic uses of patents in markets for technology. In particular, we study the behaviors of technological firms, patent brokers and patent trolls and explore their consequences on the amount of R&D investments of the economy. We show that patent brokers, in their pure form, are R&D increasing (i.e. they increase the R&D investments of both supplier and manufacturing firms) while patent trolls, in their pure form, are R&D decreasing. We also show that, paradoxically, an optimal positive level of trolling may exist if the probability to secure market transactions and the probability to encounter trolls are positively correlated. Then we discuss the normative implications of this research. Among others, we argue that changes in patent laws are needed in order to limit the possibility of trolling; however, the difficulty is that those changes might also affect the development of technological firms and brokers. Several possible evolutions of international patent laws are hence discussed.

Keywords: Markets for technology; Technological firms; Patent; Troll; Broker; Start-up (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2012-11
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Published in Journal of Economic Behavior and Organization, 2012, 84 (2), pp.633-641. ⟨10.1016/j.jebo.2012.09.007⟩

There are no downloads for this item, see the EconPapers FAQ for hints about obtaining it.

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:hal:journl:hal-04061575

DOI: 10.1016/j.jebo.2012.09.007

Access Statistics for this paper

More papers in Post-Print from HAL
Bibliographic data for series maintained by CCSD ().