Cookies?
Library Header Image
LSE Research Online LSE Library Services

Patents vs trade secrets: knowledge licensing and spillover

Bhattacharya, Sudipto and Guriev, Sergei (2005) Patents vs trade secrets: knowledge licensing and spillover. . Centre for Economic Policy Research (Great Britain), London, UK.

[img]
Preview
PDF
Download (528kB) | Preview

Abstract

We develop a model of two-stage cumulative research and development (R&D), in which one Research Unit (RU) with an innovative idea bargains to license her nonverifiable interim knowledge exclusively to one of two competing Development Units (DUs) via one of two alternative modes: an Open sale after patenting this knowledge, or a Closed sale in which precluding further disclosure to a competing DU requires the RU to hold a stake in the licensed DU’s post-invention revenues. Both modes lead to partial leakage of RU’s knowledge from its description, to the licensed DU alone in a closed sale, and to both DUs in an open sale. We find that higher levels of interim knowledge are more likely to be licensed via closed sales. If the extent of leakage is lower, more RUs choose open sales, generating a non-monotonic relationship between the strength of Intellectual Property Rights (IPR) and aggregate R&D expenditures and the overall likelihood of development by either DU.

Item Type: Monograph (Working Paper)
Official URL: http://www.lse.ac.uk/collections/accountingAndFina...
Additional Information: LSE has developed LSE Research Online so that users may access research output of the School. Copyright © and Moral Rights for the papers on this site are retained by the individual authors and/or other copyright owners. Users may download and/or print one copy of any article(s) in LSE Research Online to facilitate their private study or for non-commercial research. You may not engage in further distribution of the material or use it for any profit-making activities or any commercial gain. You may freely distribute the URL (http://eprints.lse.ac.uk) of the LSE Research Online website.
Divisions: LSE
Subjects: H Social Sciences > HG Finance
Date Deposited: 15 Jun 2006
Last Modified: 15 Sep 2023 23:02
URI: http://eprints.lse.ac.uk/id/eprint/444

Actions (login required)

View Item View Item

Downloads

Downloads per month over past year

View more statistics