The national regulation of pharmaceutical markets and the timing of new drug launches in Europe

We analyze the impact of national pharmaceutical regulation on the launch delay of new chemical entities approved by the EMEA's centralized procedure. We find that direct price control regimes have a significantly negative impact on the launch timing. These results cannot be found when investigating the impact of indirect price controls. Our results show that Germany (65%) has the highest probability of experiencing an early launch, while it is the lowest in southern European countries (18% for Portugal and 19% for Greece). This difference accrues from both price regulation and market attractiveness, since southern European countries generally have lower prices. Due to the possibilities for parallel trade within the EU, pharmaceutical companies, by acting strategically, may further increase launch delays

The effect of design protection on price and price dispersion: Evidence from automotive spare parts

The design right is a widely used but poorly understood intellectual property right that allows the protection of products’ aesthetics and outer appearances. We study the influence of design right protection on price by exploiting cross-country differences in the scope of protection in the European automotive spare parts market: In some countries, repair parts are exempted from design protection, while in others they are not. Based on detailed price data, our difference-in-differences estimates imply that design protection increases prices by about 5–8%, with large differences between carmakers. We then link our findings to the literature on deviations from the law of one price. We document large cross-country price deviations for identical spare parts and provide evidence that a part of these price deviations can be explained by the lack of harmonization of design right protection in combination with carmakers’ pricing-to-market strategies

Economic incongruities in the European patent system. Bruegel Working Paper No. 2009/01, January 2009

This paper argues that the consequences of the ‘fragmentation’ of the European patent system are more dramatic than the mere prohibitive costs of maintaining a patent in force in many jurisdictions. First, detailed analysis of judicial systems in several European countries and four case studies provide evidence suggesting that heterogeneous national litigation costs, practices and outcome induce a high level of uncertainty. Second, a high degree of managerial complexity results from systemic incongruities due to easier ‘parallel imports’, possible ‘time paradoxes’ and the de facto paradox of having EU‐level competition policy and granting authority ultimately facing national jurisdictional primacy on patent issues. These high degrees of uncertainty and complexity contribute to reduce the effectiveness of the European patent system and provide additional arguments in favour of the Community patent and a centralized litigation in Europe

The London Agreement and the cost of patenting in Europe. Bruegel Working Paper No. 2008/05, October 2008

This paper analyses the consequences for the European Patent System (EPS) of the recently ratified London Agreement (LA), which aims to reduce the translation requirements for patent validation procedures in 15 out of 34 national patent offices. The simulations suggest that the cost of patenting has been reduced by 20 to 30 percent since the enforcement of the LA. With an average translation cost saving of €3,600 per patent, the total savings for the business sector amount to about €220 millions. The fee elasticity of patents being about ‐0.4, one may expect an increase in patent filings of eight to 12 percent. Despite the translation cost savings, the relative cost of a European patent validated in six (thirteen) countries is still at least five (seven) times higher than in the United States

The impact of knowledge diversity on inventive performance at European universities

The diversity of knowledge and skills is considered to be good for scientific inquiry. We challenge this general statement by analyzing to what extent the diversity in knowledge background of research teams affects their inventive performance. Using patent data assigned to 60 European universities in the fields of chemistry and pharmaceuticals, a research team is defined as a group of inventors on a patent application. Team's scientific knowledge is assessed with their publication records and inventive performance with the number of forward patent citations. Two types of diversity are considered :(i) diversity in joint research experience (i.e. share of publications co-authored among team members in the total publication output of the team) and (ii) diversity in scientific disciplines (i.e. dispersion of team's knowledge across scientific disciplines). Results reveal an inverted U-shaped relationship between the diversity in joint research experience and team's inventive performance. Results confirm that diversity in scientific disciplines improves inventing performance of the team. However, teams composed of a generalist researchers with an overlap in their disciplinary background outperform teams composed of specialists.info:eu-repo/semantics/nonPublishe

Academic Patenting in Belgium:Methodology and Evidence.

Universities are increasingly being called upon to contribute to economic development and competitiveness. This Study aims to assess contribution of academic scientists working at universities located in the French-speaking Community of Belgium to patented technology. Matching names of academic scientists to inventors listed on patent applications filed at the EPO between 1994-2007, we find that 9-12% of academics working in science are inventors, among them 23% are woman. Academic scientists are listed as inventors on 6.5% of the EPO patent applications filed by résidents of the French-speaking Community of Belgium. Universities are applicants on only 33.3% of patents invented by their scientists but this share has increased significantly in recent years. These results are then compared with similar trends in other European countries and in the United States.info:eu-repo/semantics/nonPublishe

Entrepreneurial Scientists and their Publication Performance. An Insight from Belgium

Intensification of university-industry interactions raises concerns about the potential negative impact it may have on the pace of scientific progress. This paper analyzes the relationship between academic patenting, research collaboration and quality of scientic output in a panel of 268 patenting and non-patenting life-science researchers from five universities in Belgium. Results suggest that scientists benefit from research collaboration with industry as witnessed by higher productivity and higher annual citation frequencies. Patenting positively correlates with higher quality of scientific output, except when industry is directly involved in the patenting process. In contrast to previous studies we do not end a positive relationship between patenting and citations.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishe

Essays on patent systems and academic patenting

The past decade has witnessed a second academic revolution with the new role of contributing to economic growth and social development assigned to universities. A real phenomenon embedded in this new role is the right given to universities to file for a patent protection over publicly funded research and the possibility to retain financial returns from its license or selling. The aim of this thesis is to better understand this phenomenon and its relationship to scientific production.Starting with the role patents pay in stimulating innovation, Chapter 2 assesses the cost of rewarding and enforcing exclusive patent rights in Europe and discusses implications for patenting at universities.Chapter 3 aims to document patenting at universities in Belgium by applying the definition of university-invented patents. It challenges the ‘European Paradox’, the view that despite being good in producing science, European research institutions are not successful in transferring it to the real economy.Chapters 4 and 5 investigate the relationship between patenting and scientific productivity. Chapter 4 questions the critique that patenting at universities may have a detrimental effect on scientific progress. Chapter 5 challenges the view that knowledge diversity increases group ability to innovate. It further enhances our understanding of how different ways of achieving diversity affect team inventive performance.Doctorat en Sciences économiques et de gestioninfo:eu-repo/semantics/nonPublishe

Entrepreneurial Scientists and their Publication Performance. An Insight from Belgium

Intensification of university-industry interactions raises concerns about the potential negative impact it may have on the pace of scientific progress. This paper analyzes the relationship between academic patenting, research collaboration and quality of scientic output in a panel of 268 patenting and non-patenting life-science researchers from five universities in Belgium. Results suggest that scientists benefit from research collaboration with industry as witnessed by higher productivity and higher annual citation frequencies. Patenting positively correlates with higher quality of scientific output, except when industry is directly involved in the patenting process. In contrast to previous studies we do not end a positive relationship between patenting and citations.patenting; scientific publication; quality; collaboration