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==Definitions==<pdf>File:McN-PatentThicket-Egan-092215.pdf</pdf>
A) '''Saturated Invention Spaces:''' The earliest definition of a patent thicket that we found is in Teece (1998), who points out a simple issue with patentsSee the [[Patent Thicket Strategic Planning]] page for future steps. We refer to this as ‘saturated invention spaces’ and describe it as when a single firm, or a small number of firms, successfully patents an entire technological area. (p.15)* '''''Imperfect competition: a small number of firms hold all possible patent rights in an area'''''
Terms like “cluster”, “related”, “adjacent”, or “coherent group” to describe either patents or inventions. However, we also included several definitions that described patents as “minor” or “marginal” provided that there was no suggestion of bad faithSee the [[PTLR Codification]] page for details
B) '''Diversely-held Complimentary Inputs (DHCI):''' 1) products require complementary patented inputs; 2) these inputs are diversely-held (i.e. held by N patent-holders); and 3) patent-holders set their license prices independently. (Shapiro, pg.17)* '''''Coordination: patent holders determine licensing rates independently'''''See the [[PTLR Process]] page for details
“Diversely-held” and “complementary inputs,” or clear synonyms like “dispersed” or “fragmented” pertaining to ownership and “Cournot problem”, “multiple marginalization”, etc. in the context of licensing of patents held by multiple parties==Test Run==
C) '''Overlapping PatentsExample BibTeX:'''#The second most common foundation for a patent thicket issue relies on overlapping patents. Patent overlaps can be horizontal (i.e. though patents that are largely adjacent to one another) or vertical (i.e. when patents are related through cumulative innovation). Horizontal overlaps arise because patent rights are imperfectly defined property rights. (p.20)#Refinement patents and research tool patents could result in vertically overlapping patent rights (or at least contractual rights). (p.21)* '''''Imperfectly defined property rights: wasteful duplication of licensing expenditure'''''
Any sense of patent overlaps including “overlapping claims” or “similar claims” @article{BibTeXKeyGoesHere, and/or uncertainty over whether multiple patents may simultaneously be infringed title={}, author={}, journal={}, year={}, abstract={}, discipline={}, research_type={}, industry={}, thicket_stance={}, thicket_stance_extract={}, thicket_def={}, thicket_def_extract={}, tags={}, filename={} }
D) '''Gaming the Patent System:''' There are information asymmetries between a patent applicant and the patent office and a patent applicant may take some inappropriate action, for example by applying for a patent that is not novel or is obvious. Such an inappropriate action can impose costs on the patent office and may generate negative externalities, imposing costs on genuine innovators. We refer to this situation as ‘gaming the patent system’. (p.21)*'''''Moral hazard: patent applicants take hidden action and impose costs on genuine innovators'''''===Files===
Primarily descriptions of patents as “questionable” “dubious” “bad”, “likely invalid” and “junk,” and phrases congruent with “impeding genuine innovators” or “rent-seeking activities”, as well as other indications of bad faith ====Modern Terms==== E) '''Transaction Costs:''' All patent-based interactions, from application to licensing to litigation, are subject to transaction and search costs. Patent applications are subject to transaction costs in the form of prosecution costs and renewal (‘maintenance’) fees. These costs and fees are supposed to de-incentivize low value patents. However, they may also de-incentivize invention by small firms and individuals. (p.13) F) '''Probabilistic Patents:''' Lemley and Shapiro (2005, 2006) emphasize that patents are ‘probabilistic’. They suggest that “there is no way to determine with certainty whether the patent is valid and infringed without litigating to judgment." Enforcement of patent rights - observing and redressing infringement of patent claims - is therefore both costly and uncertainty. (p.11) G) '''Unspecified/Extended Use:''' Kiley (1992) claims that applying for a patent based on an inventive step that does not have a clearly articulated stand-alone commercial value creates economic inefficiencies. But often it can be difficult to foresee which particular use of an invention will be profitable and which won’t. (p.8) H) '''Search Costs:''' Searching for relevant patents may impose material costs. Wang (2010) argues that this may be particularly burdensome for new entrants who need to develop suitable search capabilities. (p.13) I) '''(Patent) Hold-up:''' The Federal Trade Commission (2011) provides the following definition of patent hold-up: “‘Hold-up’ describe[s] a patentee’s ability to extract a higher license fee after an accused infringer has sunk costs into implementing the patented technology than the patentee could have obtained Pick 5 files at the time of [the accused infringer’s] design decisions.” However, some recent papers have stressed the obvious diametrically opposite problem. Langus et al. (2013), for example, point out that :''“the licensee may often engage in a reverse hold up”. Reverse patent hold-up, loosely put, is where the accused infringer extracts zero (via infringing) license fee after the patent owner has sunk costs in developing :the patented technology and alleged infringement has taken place. Again, this occurs as patents are not self-enforcing. Implementers can simply use the invention covered by a patent and wait to get sued, using as :many diversionary tactics in the courts as is possible, knowing that it is hard, time-consuming, and expensive for a patentee to get an injunction. The judicial system is far random from perfect; the patentee has few remedies :absent a courts intervention.'' (p.11-12) J) '''Strategic Patents:''' Strategic patenting is sometimes defined as accumulating patents merely to achieve design freedom. These patents can be used as bargaining chips, rather than for their intrinsic value, and as such are largely welfare neutral, except in conjunction with transaction costs and cross- licensing agreements (discussed shortly). Much of the discussion of strategic patents takes place in the context of the patent thicket literature. (p.13):''“To obtain the rights to infringe patents held by external parties and to improve their leverage in negotiations with other patent owners, these firms amass larger patent portfolios of their own with which to trade.” – :Hall and Ziedonis (2001)'' K) '''Hold-out:''' Hold-out can occur in the context of multilateral bargaining, for example when different products can be made out of different, diversely-held patented technologies. Farrell (2009) explains that when a partial agreement benefits the “nonparticipating (holdout) player”, self-interest and social welfare may not be aligned. (p.12-13) ===Relative Definition Quotes=== Shapiro: "a dense web of overlapping intellectual property rights that a company must hack its way through in order to actually commercialize new technology" (p.3-4) Kiley: "Those operating at the beginnings of the road are most insistent on their right to nail down leverage that will remain formidable despite market place rejection of the uses to which they say their inventions may be put. The frank aim of these early stage workers is to control ultimate applications discovered by others." (p. 8) =Measures= ==Types== # '''Theory:''' Economic theory papers are largely concerned with the DHCI problem. (p.5)# '''Empirical:''' Papers that drift towards first including overlapping patents along with DHCI, and then begin abandoning the usage of DCHI. (p.5)# '''Discussion:''' It seems that economists favor DHCI and overlaps, cite Shapiro (2001) and do more theoretical work; whereas legal scholars favor overlaps, cite Heller and Eisenberg (1998) Dropbox\coauthoredprojects\Egan and provide discussion. (p.30) ==Industries== #Basic Science: ==Current List of Papers== ===Processed papers=== ===Files===Teece\CandidatePapers
Untangling the Economics of Patent Thickets (view source)
Revision as of 14:43, 2 September 2020
, 14:43, 2 September 2020no edit summary
{{AcademicPaper
|Has title=Untangling the Economics of Patent Thicket Literature ReviewThickets
|Has author=Ed Egan, David Teece
|Has RAs=Lauren Bass,
|Has paper status=Working paper
}}
==Latest Progress==
The PDF-to-Text converter, the key terms finder, and phrase extraction scripts all work well and have been tested. The Google Scholar Web Crawler is being worked on by Christy Warden, current status unknown.
192 text versions of papers have been assembled in "Candidate Papers by LB." These were used as a test set for developing an analysis protocol for the entire paper. An analysis protocol has been developed that involves taking the counts of each term by topic per paper to assign each paper 1-4 topics. The process also counts the number of key terms in each paper for relevance, the number of modern terms, the year of the paper, the number of cost terms, the area of the paper, and the mentions of particular authors. All of this analysis is then dumped into artifacts. The analysis protocol is currently hardcoded. Once a set list of terms has been established, a soft-coded version should be able to be developed (in progress).
Larger test set desired to be analyzed and soft-coded on.
==The Paper==
\coauthoredprojects\Egan and Teece\McN-PatentThicket-Egan-092215.pdf
This file is posted at http://www.bakerinstitute.org/research/untangling-patent-thicket-literature
===Core Terms=Codification==
List them here:*Cockburn MacGarvie (2006) - Entry And Patenting In The Software Industry.pdf*Murray Stern (2007) - Do formal intellectual property rights hinder the free flow of scientific knowledge?: An empirical test of the anti-commons hypothesis*...*Current directory containing candidate papers...*Processed BibTeX master file...
Do the following:
*Create a new text file in the dropbox. Note where the file is saved!
*Find each paper on Google Scholar and put the BibTeX entry into the text file
*Add the fields from the sample entry above and file them out as follows:
**Disciple: publication type
**Research_type: 'Types' (see above)
**Industry: industries (see above)
**thicket_def_extract: The text from the paper that you will use to decide the thicket definition
**thicket_def: one or more of DHCI, Saturated, Overlapping, Gaming, etc.
**tags: hash tags for modern terms and topic key words, e.g., #Probabilistic, #PatentPool, etc.
**Filename: Only download the file if we don't have it in '''Candidate Papers'''. Put the file name in this tag.
==Maybe Important Files==
*PTLRUp.bib - Another bibliography, additions or subtractions unknown
*Files in C:\Users\Ed\Dropbox\coauthoredprojects\Egan and Teece\ThicketWiki
**Particularly: CoreWithNewCoreForSorting-rev.txt
==.PL files==
