Classic patent theory relies on an incentive model to justify the grant of exclusionary patent rights. Under the model, potential patent rights provide an incentive to those who would set about the task of innovating. In constitutional language, this incentive operates to promote the progress in the “useful arts.” Patents […]
My research did not reveal any trademark infringement lawsuits over post-sale competitive couponing against Catalina Marketing (the manufacturer of the most popular post-sale couponing system), any retailers deploying Catalina Marketing’s system, or any advertisers purchasing the right to deliver competitive coupons. … In July 2007, I searched Westlaw’s “ALLCASES” database […]
Previous papers have demonstrated the link between these characteristics and the number of patent litigations. Next, we match our databases to the Stanford IP litigation database in order to obtain the number of litigations per patent. This database contains data on more than 100,000 intellectual property cases filed from January […]
This article addresses a largely neglected issue: the scope of injunctions against patent infringement. First, the article uses an economic model for infringer incentives to show how concerns of injunction scope are substantially analogous to much more widely examined concerns of patent scope. Second, the article discusses existing U.S. law […]
Macaulay’s (1963) “Non-contractual relations in business: a preliminary study” was ahead of its time. The article was published in a prominent place. The American Sociological Review (ASR) is one of the sociology’s two flagship journals. Still, its citations (in the ISI index) were but drips until the middle of the […]
This article reports the findings of an empirical analysis of the relative ages of patents litigated by practicing and non-practicing patentees. Studying all infringement claims brought to enforce a sample of recently expired patents, I find considerable variance. Product-producing companies predominately enforce their patents soon after issuance and complete their […]
Patent lawsuits are disruptive, unpredictable, and costly. The inability to anticipate patent litigation makes it practically uninsurable, exposes companies to late-stage suits, and drives companies to rapidly accumulate patents in order to ward off litigation. This article confronts this systemic problem, by examining the factors that lead a particular patent […]
Patentees overwhelmingly lose their cases, despite a seeming host of procedural advantages. The same is not true of other IP plaintiffs. Why? […]
This purpose of this essay is to provide an early analysis of some of the most substantial law and policy concerns raised by the very recent en banc decision of the United States Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit in the now famous Therasense v. Becton Dickinson case. The […]
While the literature examining university engagement in patenting and technology transfer is quite developed, commentators largely have overlooked university involvement in patent litigation. This article focuses on one aspect of that involvement—initiation of patent infringement litigation—by providing a quantitative and textual analysis of patent infringement actions initiated by universities from […]