Changes
Jump to navigation
Jump to search
no edit summary
*Patent licensing is currently poorly understood (what are typical rates?)
*Patent pools are growing in popularity and are an increasingly important part of the licensing ecosystem.
=To Do=
We need to delimit the scope of this project. The single biggest decision is whether or not we want to include an empirical estimation or do some modelling. The paper will be dramatically different accordingly. There are three obvious possibilities:
#A case-based paper, with written theory and a small number of examples.
#An empirical paper, with written theory and solid empirics.
#A theory paper, where we outline each of the arguments and provide formal modelling that captures at least the major thrust of the arguments.
In all cases, we would need a literature review done - so I will do a first pass at this next. Likewise, in all cases we will need to get the basic economics down. Please read the section below and start fixing and adding material (or email it to me and I'll do it, if you aren't comfortable with the wiki).
The case-based paper is quick and easy, but isn't going to place into a good journal. The empirical paper, if done well (see the product-based sample, below) could place very well. A theory paper is only worthwhile if there is something sufficiently interesting going on to merit a model (most likely in the interaction between complements and network effects, etc).
=Basic Economics=
For a basic model of Cournot complements applied to (blocking) patents, see Shapiro (2001), Navigating the Patent Thicket: Cross Licenses,
Patent Pools, and Standard Setting. [[http://www.nber.org/chapters/c10778(pdf from NBER)]].
The essential argument is that by including patents in a pool, multiple entities can avoid charging higher prices (and receiving lower profits) that arise from a failure to coordinate (as a result of 'balkanized rights').
#Using university licensing
#A product-based sample
#Using a lawyer's sample
BRG may also have some data that is useable providing it is suitably anonymized and processed.
==University Licensing==
==A Product-based sample==
Another, much more exciting, option would be to 'build' (i.e., pretend to build) a product that requires a number of patents, including those from a poolone or more pools. Ideally we would want to 'implement' one or more standards and actually negotiate potential licensing agreements(i. This likely requires e., get terms but don't buy rights). We would almost certainly need:*Human Subjects approval (see:http://cphs.berkeley.edu/review.html), which can be difficultand time consuming. But I've seen similar real-world negotiation projects done before (e.g. Antoinette's Schoar's hold-up paper). We would *Assistance from an electrical engineer or other field expert (almost certainly, though for some standards technologies I might be be able to do itthe heavy lifting) need assistance from an electrical engineer or other field expert, a .*A lawyer, and considerable - though we might be able to minimize this.*Considerable GSI support. This would not be cheap or easy. But we would have a well-defined sample and it would be fantastic research if we can could pull it off. ==A Lawyer's Sample== There have been several VC studies that have used data from a single lawyer. There is always the problem of generalizability - Is the IP licensed actually representative? Would another lawyer have negotiated different terms on the same IP? Etc... But with these caveats in mind, this is do-able. Having data from more than one law firm allows some empirical fixes (law firm fixed-effects to suck out unwanted variation). However, these types of relationships are exceeding difficult to set-up and invariably require anonymizing of the data, etc.
