Objective
Patent systems are supposed to spur incentives to innovate 1) by granting inventors temporary monopoly rights that allow them to recoup their research and development (R&D) investment and 2) by facilitating follow-up inventions by making information about technical inventions available to the public. In other words, patents make technical information available to society at the cost of “privatization” of this knowledge. Knowledge freely available to the public, as for instance through scientific publications, has been shown to be essential for corporate innovation and productivity growth. The privatization of knowledge can, hence, hamper innovation and technological progress.
This project makes use of a natural experiment to investigate the effects of knowledge privatization. It is in general hard to examine the effects of patent systems because virtually all industrialized economies have patent systems in place so that a counterfactual situation, i.e. how an economy would look like without patents, is missing as a required benchmark for policy evaluation. This project will make use of the introduction of software patents in the U.S. in the mid-1990s as an event that allows identifying effects of the establishment of patent rights.
This project will, first, investigate the extent to which the introduction of software patents led to a privatization of knowledge. In other word, the switch from publications in academic journals and proceedings to patents by individual software engineers will be scrutinized. In the next steps, implications of knowledge privatization for corporate productivity and industry concentration of R&D will be investigated. Since the introduction of U.S. software patents coincided with the internet revolution control samples from Europe will be used. Europe did not experience an introduction of software patents in the 1990s so that the comparison allows to separate patent regulation induced effects from macroeconomic shocks.
Fields of science (EuroSciVoc)
CORDIS classifies projects with EuroSciVoc, a multilingual taxonomy of fields of science, through a semi-automatic process based on NLP techniques. See: https://op.europa.eu/en/web/eu-vocabularies/euroscivoc.
CORDIS classifies projects with EuroSciVoc, a multilingual taxonomy of fields of science, through a semi-automatic process based on NLP techniques. See: https://op.europa.eu/en/web/eu-vocabularies/euroscivoc.
- natural sciences computer and information sciences software
- natural sciences computer and information sciences internet
- social sciences political sciences political transitions revolutions
- social sciences economics and business economics production economics productivity
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Programme(s)
Multi-annual funding programmes that define the EU’s priorities for research and innovation.
Multi-annual funding programmes that define the EU’s priorities for research and innovation.
Topic(s)
Calls for proposals are divided into topics. A topic defines a specific subject or area for which applicants can submit proposals. The description of a topic comprises its specific scope and the expected impact of the funded project.
Calls for proposals are divided into topics. A topic defines a specific subject or area for which applicants can submit proposals. The description of a topic comprises its specific scope and the expected impact of the funded project.
Call for proposal
Procedure for inviting applicants to submit project proposals, with the aim of receiving EU funding.
Procedure for inviting applicants to submit project proposals, with the aim of receiving EU funding.
FP7-PEOPLE-2013-CIG
See other projects for this call
Funding Scheme
Funding scheme (or “Type of Action”) inside a programme with common features. It specifies: the scope of what is funded; the reimbursement rate; specific evaluation criteria to qualify for funding; and the use of simplified forms of costs like lump sums.
Funding scheme (or “Type of Action”) inside a programme with common features. It specifies: the scope of what is funded; the reimbursement rate; specific evaluation criteria to qualify for funding; and the use of simplified forms of costs like lump sums.
MC-CIG - Support for training and career development of researcher (CIG)
Coordinator
4365 ESCH-SUR-ALZETTE
Luxembourg
The total costs incurred by this organisation to participate in the project, including direct and indirect costs. This amount is a subset of the overall project budget.