FEE VERSUS ROYALTY POLICY IN LICENSING THROUGH BARGAINING: AN APPLICATION OF THE NASH BARGAINING SOLUTION

In this paper, we consider a Cournot duopoly market in which the patent‐holding firm negotiates with its rival firm about payments for licensing a cost‐reducing innovation. Applying the Nash bargaining solution, we compare two licensing policies, a fixed fee and a royalty. Our results are as follows. Royalty licensing is better than fixed fee licensing for both firms if the innovation is not drastic. So, royalty licensing is always carried out. Moreover, though there exists a case in which consumers prefer fixed fee licensing, royalty licensing is always superior to fixed fee licensing from the social point of view.     

On Patent Licensing in Spatial Competition

We consider the optimal licensing strategy of an outsider patentee as well as an insider patentee in a linear city framework where firms compete in price. We show that offering royalty is best for an outsider patentee for both drastic and non-drastic innovations. For an insider patentee, offering no license is the best when the innovation is drastic, while royalty is optimal when the innovation is non-drastic. The incentive for innovation is higher for an outsider patentee compared to an insider patentee. The overall increase in welfare due to an innovation is the same for both outsider and insider patentees.     

‘To sell or not to sell’: Licensing versus selling by an outside innovator

We study various modes of technology transfer of an outside innovator in a spatial framework when the potential licensees are asymmetric. In addition to different licensing options, we also look into the option of selling the property rights of innovation and find the optimal mode of technology transfer. For licensing we find the optimal policy is to offer pure royalty contracts to both licensee firms when cost differentials between the firms are relatively small compared to the transportation cost, otherwise offer a fixed fee licensing contract to the efficient firm only. Interestingly, we show the innovator is always better-off selling the innovation to any one of the firms who further licenses it to the rival firm. The result holds irrespective of the size of the innovation (drastic or non-drastic) and the degree of cost asymmetry between the licensees. Social welfare is greater under selling than licensing.     

On Licensing Under Bertrand Competition

This paper considers licensing by an innovating firm to its competitor in a differentiated duopoly with Bertrand competition. A principal finding is that royalty licensing may be superior to fee licensing for the innovating firm both when the innovation is drastic and when the innovation is non-drastic.     

Licensing under convex costs

We show that both the outside and inside innovators license a new product (or drastic process innovation) to all potential licensees in the presence of convex costs, which occur under decreasing returns to scale technologies. An implication of our analysis is that a monopolist producer may prefer technology licensing in a homogeneous goods industry. We also show that an inside innovator’s incentive for innovation may be higher than that of an outside innovator.     

Quality differentiation and product innovation licensing

Evidence reveals that there are more than 50% product innovation licensings applied within industries. We study product innovation licensing (quality-enhancing licensing) in both exclusive and non-exclusive schemes each under unit/revenue royalty and fixed fee in a vertically differentiated Cournot oligopoly, where a quality-leading firm is an internal licensor. We show that, under a non-exclusive licensing, royalty licensing is the superior policy for the licensor if quality difference within firms is small, regardless of whether a unit or revenue royalty scheme is offered. Under an exclusive licensing, a two-part tariff is optimal. If fixed fee licensing is practicable, the licensor favors an exclusive licensing. Furthermore, an increase in quality difference within firms increases the optimal rates. Using the simulated results, we examine that licensing improves social welfare in all schemes, and the number of licensees will influence the magnitude of welfare enhancement.     

A Model of Technology Gap,Product Cycle,and the Process of Catching up Between the North and the South*

The paper presents a multi-product two-country overlapping generations model of trade and innovation. We show that for a low level of innovation (unitation) in the South, firms in the North innovate at a level which guarantees a long-term technological gap between the North and the South. However, a high innovation level in the South leads to a situation where the South can catch up the North in a finite time. This model differs from the existing literature in two major aspects. a) Except for the head start of the North we assume that the North and the South are identical with respect to factor endowment and their ability to develop new goods. b) It is general enough to explain both the product cycle phenomena and the catching-up process.     

Technology licensing under optimal tax policy

This paper examines the role of government policy in technology licensing decision. We show that both the outside and the inside innovators license a new product (or drastic process innovation) to all potential licensees in the presence of tax/subsidy policies. An implication of our analysis is that a monopolist producer may prefer technology licensing in a homogeneous goods industry. Our results also provide a rationale for franchising to multiple sellers.     

Information quality choice and information disclosure in oligopoly

In this paper, we provide a framework to analyze the information disclosure and information quality choice in the oligopoly in which one firm has the opportunity to choose her information quality flexibly and then decide her information disclosure rule after she has observed her information.We find that in the Cournot (Bertrand)competition, when the goods are substitutes (complements) and the degree of substitution (complement) is small enough, the firm will choose the maximal information quality. However, if the degree of substitution (complement) is large enough, the information quality is some intermediate value. On the other hand, in the Cournot (Bertrand) competition, when the goods are complements (substitutes), the maximal information quality will be chosen. We also find that the Fully Revealing case in which the probability of information disclosure is one will occur in (i) the Cournot competition with sufficiently small degree of substitution; (ii) the Cournot competition when goods are complements; (iii) the Bertrand competition when goods are substitutes; (iv) the Bertrand competition with sufficiently small degree of complements. Moreover, we show that the No Revealing case in which the probability of information disclosure is zero will never show up.     

考虑革新程度认知差异的新产品技术授权研究

建立博弈模型，探讨技术革新认知差异情形下，外部技术创新者向寡占竞争格局的生产企业授权生产新产品专利的最优决策问题。研究发现，创新授权者关于新产品市场的认知劣势使固定收费契约不具备完全优于特许权收费契约的绝对优势；在双重收费契约下，专利人授权对象选择因认知差异影响，由排他性授权向非排他性授权决策转变；认知差异性削弱了创新企业市场势力，从而提高特许权收费契约优势，而拍卖、股权投资等有助于创新企业克服认知劣势。据此，建议创新企业明晰创新专利长期回报，综合搭配应用多种授权契约；以非排他性授权策略配合特许权收费、双重收费和股权投资等契约模式，实现技术交易产业链激励共容下的利润最大化，促进技术创新传播应用，提高社会福利水平。     

License auctions with royalty contracts for (winners and) losers

This paper revisits the licensing of a non-drastic process innovation by an outside innovator to a Cournot oligopoly. We propose a new mechanism that combines a restrictive license auction with royalty licensing. This mechanism is more profitable than standard license auctions, auctioning royalty contracts, fixed-fee licensing, pure royalty licensing, and two-part tariffs. The key features are that royalty contracts are auctioned and that losers of the auction are granted the option to sign a royalty contract. Remarkably, combining royalties for winners and losers of the auction makes the integer constraint concerning the number of licenses irrelevant.     

创新技术价值信息不对称下厂商的许可策略

本文构建了创新技术商业价值信息不对称情况下在位创新厂商和生产厂商间的技术许可博弈模型,并运用逆向归纳法分别寻求混同均衡和分离均衡。分析结果表明,若运用两部制许可方式,从创新厂商的角度出发,当创新技术高经济价值的可能性较大时,高提成费用混同许可最优;当创新技术低经济价值的可能性较大时,低提成费用混同许可最优。此外,本文还得出固定费用许可条件下的最优许可策略。无论厂商选择何种许可方式,均不存在分离均衡。     

Oligopoly with a large number of competitors: asymmetric limit result

We address how profitable innovation is in a competitive market by investigating the asymmetric oligopoly model in which 1 firm (innovator) has a cost advantage that is not drastic enough for her to become a monopolist, and by inducing asymmetric limit outcomes when the number of the other firms (laggard firms) goes to infinity. If the innovator is the Stackelberg leader, two cases can arise: (i) the innovator behaves as in the competitive market or (ii) she occupies the entire market but cannot make the price. If we consider Cournot competition, the innovator becomes the partial monopolist. An erratum to this article can be found at     

Contracts payments for ecosystem services: the case of bio-pospecting

We examine the economics of royalties in bioprospecting contracts between a pharmaceutical and genetic resource supplier (local), with an eye to understanding the relative advantages of indexing royalty payments to gross revenue or net revenue. We show a risk-averse firm facing only production or only cost risks will index royalties to net revenue. When facing both types of risk, the choice of royalty type depends on the relative magnitudes of the production and cost risk. In each case, the risk-averse firm chooses the royalty type that shifts as much risk as possible to the local. When the local is risk neutral, the pharmaceutical's and local's preferences are compatible. If the local is risk averse and there is only one type of risk, it will prefer a gross revenue royalty, and shift as much risk as possible to the firm: here the local and firm preferences are compatible only if the firm is risk-neutral, Lastly, we show if the firm sets the terms of the contract, and both agents are risk averse, the firm will not likely volunteer to implement the socially optimal royalty arrangement as it prefers to shift as much risk to the local, who now also prefers a more certain return. This last outcome is at the heart of the benefit sharing discussion and suggests if risk sharing and equity are a concern in benefit sharing, then the choice of royalty type can be an important part of negotiations between pharmaceuticals and locals for the phytochemical from nature for new drug discovery.     

外国技术授权策略与本国关税政策之探讨

该文将以一个拥有技术优势,且将其产品输往本国寡占市场中的外国厂商为对象,探讨其对本国厂商的最适技术授权策略,以及该策略是否受关税保护贸易政策之影响.在该文的研究结论中,我们可以发现下列三点:(1)在自由贸易条件下,当外国企业可授权国内二家厂商时,其最适授权策略,会选择同时授权于国内二家技术劣势厂商.当外国厂商仅可授权国内一家技术劣势厂商时,若市场规模相对较小,国外技术优势厂商之最适单位权利金订定为存在内部解,且会受市场规模的影响,市场规模值愈大,权利金愈高.当市场规模相对较大时,则国外技术优势厂商之最适单位权利金恰等于其技术创新所能节省的成本幅度.(2)在关税政策条件下,国外技术优势厂商可同时授权国内二家厂商时,其授权策略不受关税政策影响.在可授权国内一家技术劣势厂商时,若市场规模相对较大,其授权策略不受关税政策影响.若市场规模相对较小,在自由贸易条件下外国厂商的授权权利金将高于采取关税政策条件下的水准.(3)在本国政府的最适关税政策下,不论是当外国厂商可授权本国二家厂商之 Nash 均衡或可授权本国一家厂商之 Nash 均衡,皆有助于本国福利水准的提升.     

Licensing to a durable-good duopoly in patent litigation

Incorporating patent litigation into a durable-good duopoly model, we revisit the optimal licensing contract on a cost-reducing innovation. We find that both the optimal licensing contract and the innovator's licensing revenue are closely related to the patent's strength, i.e., the probability it would be found valid if tested in court. It is shown that, for a relatively weak patent (patent's strength is low), it's optimal for the innovator to charge the royalty rate as high as possible coupled with a negative fixed fee. But for a relatively strong patent (patent's strength is high), contract involving the combination of a medium level royalty rate and a positive fixed fee is optimal. We also discuss how the patent's strength affects the social welfare of a patent. Finally we present two policy suggestions that may alleviate the social welfare loss raised by the licensing of weak patents.     

Technology licensing and environmental policy instruments: Price control versus quantity control

This paper analyzes the welfare implications of abatement technology licensing under taxation and emission trading schemes. We demonstrate that a firm with a better abatement technology optimally sells a per-unit royalty license to a competitor under both schemes but offers a higher royalty rate under the latter. The emission trading scheme may outperform the taxation scheme regarding social surplus by inducing more production by the licensor and less production by the licensee. These are reversals of the welfare implications suggested by the literature that adopts a partial equilibrium approach or omits either the market for the advanced technology or the final goods.     

Technology transfer in a horizontally differentiated product market

This paper considers technology transfer in a Cournot-duopoly market where the firms produce horizontally differentiated products. The patent licensing contract consists of up-front fixed fee and per-unit output royalty for products of neither close substitutes nor isolated. In case the goods are close substitutes then only per-unit output royalty is the optimal solution. However, whether the incentive for imitation increases with product differentiation is ambiguous. Further, in case of credible imitation threat, the relationship between better technology transfer and product differentiation may be ambiguous. We have briefly addressed the implications of multiple licensing.     

Costs of Taxation and Benefits of Public Goods with Multiple Taxes and Goods

The fact that raising taxes can increase taxed labor supply through income effects is frequently and erroneously used to justify greater public good provision than indicated by traditional, compensated analyses. We develop a model including multiple public goods and taxes and derive measures of the marginal benefits of public goods and the Marginal Cost of Funds (MCF) using both compensated and uncompensated measures. We confirm that the desirability of tax‐financed public projects is independent of the method used. An important innovation is to show that the benefits of public goods must be adjusted by a benefit multiplier not previously seen in the literature if an uncompensated MCF is used.     

Licensing a quality-enhancing innovation to an upstream firm

This paper examines the case where a patent holder who is not a producer licenses its quality-enhancing innovation to an upstream firm, which sells its product through a downstream monopoly. It is found that the patent holder prefers a two-part tariff contract, which includes both a fixed-fee and per-unit output royalty. However, the royalty included in the licensing contract makes each firm price at a markup over marginal cost and therefore makes both consumers and the society worse off, if the innovation is small and the supplier is weak. From a welfare perspective, licensing by means of an ad valorem tax is more efficient, as it allows the upstream firm to be less aggressive when trading with the downstream firm.