This article has truly underlined the need for modern,creative thinking and the underlying emphasis the former shall carry. Your email address will not be published. Save my name, email, and website in this browser for the next time I comment. Do Patents Really Promote Innovation? By David Kline Do patents really promote innovation? What about now? What the experts say… Over the last 50 years, economists have found that patents continue to foster ex ante innovation — meaning, they induce people to invent because of the prospect of profiting from those inventions.
This is the world of trade secrets. Home Inspire Intellectual property rights Innovation. How patents encourage innovation in technological development and deployment. Show Hide Quick Links. Recent Publications. The analysis h Boosting solar PV markets: The role of quality infrastructure This handbook outlines the best practices to develop and implement Quality Infrastructure Scaling up Variable Renewable Power: The Role of Grid Codes Increasing the share of renewable power from variable sources, namely solar and wind energ Related Content.
Building innovation networks to transform the energy landscape 06 December Articles. But generally, to obtain a patent an inventor needs to demonstrate that their technology is new novel , useful and not obvious to someone working in the related field. To do this, they are required to describe how their technology works and what it can do. A patent can last up to 20 years, but the patent holder usually has to pay certain fees periodically throughout that year period for the patent to remain valid.
In practice, this means that if a technology has limited commercial value, the patent holder may decide to abandon the patent, at which point the technology falls into the public domain and may be freely used.
In addition to recognizing and rewarding inventors for their commercially successful technologies, patents also tell the world about inventions. In order to gain patent protection for their invention, the inventor must provide a detailed explanation of how it works.
In fact, every time a patent is granted, the amount of technological information that is freely available to the general public expands see Using and Exploiting Patent Information tutorial. WIPO is making this and other IP-related information freely available to the public through its global databases. It contains over 50 million patent applications that can be searched free of charge. The aim in making this information widely available is to spark new ideas and promote more innovation, and also to help narrow the knowledge gap which exists in developing and least developed countries.
A patent is a private right that is granted by a government authority. Essentially, the patent provides a temporary monopoly, usually for a year period , over the technology. If a patent is granted for an invention claiming the use of steam to power an engine, then the only people who can actually use steam to power an engine are those with patent rights. But once the patent expires, anyone else can use the invention. This freedom from competition supposedly provides an incentive to commercially develop the invention claimed in the patent, and also encourages further inventive activity.
Such activity is said to be good for society because it encourages technological advancement. So would we have had developments in biotechnology, information technology, nanotechnology and the like without patents? The extent to which patents actually encourage innovation is difficult to empirically measure.
Anecdotally, the CEO of any company operating in a field of high technology will probably argue their patents are crucial to the success of their business.
On the other hand, economists who have been modelling such questions for many years tend to provide much more equivocal answers.
0コメント