Some Bad News Is Good News for Foreign Investors: The Case of Intellectual Property Rights Infringement in China

Despite China's attractiveness to foreign investors, intellectual property rights (IPR) protection in China has not caught up with international standards. This research aims to quantify the relationships between IPR violations, government effectiveness, and foreign direct investment (FDI) inflows in the context of China. Our econometric modeling and estimation based on provincial level data over 2002‐2012 show that in an early development stage of law and regulatory enforcement, the bad news of a rising number of IPR dispute cases signals the good news of an improvement in law and regulatory enforcement, which encourages IPR owners to raise legal cases. By contrast, in the later development stage, when law and regulatory enforcement has become much more effective, the bad news of a rising number of IPR disputes manifests itself as very bad news. Furthermore, this study confirms that FDI inflows enhance IPR protection through improving government effectiveness, and government effectiveness is one of the key factors promoting FDIs. © 2016 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.     

Self-employment: the role of intellectual property right laws

Little is known about the impact of intellectual property rights (IPRs) on typically imitative self-employment. IPR laws have contrasting dual innovation creation and access effects on self-employment activity. The first effect is positive where strong IPR laws promote innovation and so create new opportunities for self-employment. The second effect is negative where strong IPR laws restrict access to innovation and technology used as inputs to self-employed businesses. Using a 33-country dataset over the period 1995?C2000, we estimate the impact of IPR laws on self-employment, helping to fill the vacuum of empirical evidence that has plagued policy decision making in this area. We find that patent activity has a negative effect on self-employment. However, overall, we find that more extensive and strong IPR laws have a net positive effect on self-employment activity.     

Fighting Software Piracy: Which Governance Tools Matter in Africa?

This article integrates previously missing components of government quality into the governance-piracy nexus in exploring governance mechanisms by which global obligations for the treatment of IPRs are effectively transmitted from international to the national level in the battle against piracy. It assesses the best governance tools in the fight against piracy and upholding of intellectual property rights (IPRs). The instrumentality of IPR laws (treaties) in tackling piracy through good governance mechanisms is also examined. Findings demonstrate that: (1) while all governance tools under consideration significantly decrease the incidence of piracy, corruption-control is the most effective weapon; (2) but for voice and accountability, political stability and democracy, IPR laws (treaties) are instrumental in tackling piracy through government quality dynamics of rule of law, regulation quality, government effectiveness, corruption-control, and press freedom. Hence, the need for a policy approach most conducive to expanding development is to implement an integrated system of both IPRs and corollary good governance policies. Moreover, our findings support the relevance of good governance measures in developing countries wishing to complement their emerging IPR regimes.     

Intellectual property rights,FDI, and technological development

This paper presents two simultaneous trade-offs faced by a developing country in protecting intellectual property rights (IPRs), namely (1) between attracting foreign direct investment and deterring international technology spillovers, and (2) between encouraging domestic innovation and suppressing technology diffusion. The optimal level of IPR protection depends on the technological capability of the host country. In less developed countries, IPRs should be just strong enough to induce FDI since international technology spillovers are the dominant source of technological development. A stronger level of IPR protection is instead recommended for more advanced emerging economies as a tool to exploit the potential of their domestic innovators. The results cast doubt on the adequacy of globally harmonized IPR standards that do not consider the level of development.     

Protecting Intellectual Property Rights: The Special Case of China

China is the largest source of counterfeit goods. Both U.S. and European Union customs statistics put the People's Republic of China at the top of the list of pirated product seizures. Along with the remarkable growth in the Chinese economy and exports has come the growth of counterfeit product production and distribution throughout the world. To present a full picture of the many intellectual property rights (IPR) protection problems in China this article reviews Chinese history and traditional attitudes toward individual ownership of IP under Confucianism and communism. Finally, the article presents a view of the current enforcement of IPR rights in China describing the major difficulties encountered by rights owners.     

Zum Aneignungsverhalten innovationsaktiver kleiner und mittlerer Unternehmen

This paper examines recent contributions on innovation protection practices in small and medium enterprises (SMEs), with a specific focus on the role of intellectual property rights (IPRs). Several empirical findings and possible particularities on the appropriability of SME innovations are discussed. In this way, the paper contributes to the ongoing debate about whether the less frequent use of IPRs by smaller firms should necessarily give rise to public concern. In exploring this question, the paper takes into consideration that in addition to the resource and capability constraints that smaller firms face in coping with the formal IPR system, their less frequent use of IPRs could also be related to the specific nature of their appropriability regimes.     

Foreign direct investment and intellectual property rights: evidence from Hollywood's global distribution of movies and videos

Traditional thinking about intellectual property rights (IPR) suggests that as a country strengthens its IPR standards, firms will move their governance structures away from equity based institutions such as foreign direct investment (FDI) towards more market-based relations such as licensing agreements. This hypothesis is explored by examining the behavior of Hollywood studios in both the feature film and video markets in 40 foreign countries. The analysis reveals that the behavior of Hollywood studios is more complex than this: although moderate IPRs are associated with a high degree of licensing, both high and low standards of IPR encourage more integrated governance structures.     

The Role of Ethics in the Commercialization of Indigenous Knowledge

Much has been written about indigenous knowledge and intellectual property rights (IPRs) in fields like anthropology and law. However, it remains an under-examined topic in business and management literature. In this article, we review the emerging contentious discourse, definitional issues and underlying assumptions of the western IPR and indigenous knowledge management systems. We highlight the similarities and differences between the two approaches. We argue that adopting a view that law is socially constructed with ethical underpinnings helps sort out the thorny issues related to indigenous knowledge ‘expropriation’. To do this, we draw on the role of ethical norms in the historical evolution of IPRs regimes. Finally, grounded in Stakeholder Theory, we conclude with a discussion of managerial implications.     

When an Importer's Protection of IPR Interacts with an Exporter's Level of Technology: Comparing the Impacts on the Exports of the North and South

Using bilateral trade data of countries from 2000 to 2007, this paper contributes to the empirical literature on the role of intellectual property rights (IPRs) in global trade. The existing literature has focused on how IPRs in the destination country affect exports from a source country. In this paper, we add an additional dimension: the level of technology of the exporting country (LT). This is quite important for distinguishing the impact of IPRs on the exports of developed and developing countries, since the technology levels vary across countries at different stages of development and intellectual property rights better protect exports that are technologically advanced than exports that are imitative and potentially infringing. By factoring in the level of technology (LT), our empirical analysis makes the case that IPRs can act as a barrier to the exports from the South, especially the rapidly catching‐up economies, and thus be a source for the middle‐income trap phenomenon.     

The business of product counterfeiting in China and the post-WTO membership environment

China is generally acknowledged to be the world's number one country producer of counterfeit products. After becoming a member of the World Trade Organization (WTO) China is now obligated to comply with WTO provisions on protection of intellectual property rights (IPRs). However, product counterfeiting operations in China are well entrenched. The postWTO membership environment has changed little, and such illicit operations are unlikely to subside soon. Furthermore, there is not much foreign companies can do because the response strategies recommended in the business literature have limited effect in the Chinese environment. Foreign companies may have to wait until China becomes on balance a victim instead of a benefactor of product counterfeiting before they can hope to see better protection of their IPRs.     

Winning intellectual property rights lawsuits in China

What influences foreign plaintiffs’ likelihood of winning intellectual property rights (IPR) lawsuits in an emerging economy such as China? From an institution-based view, prior scholarly debate presents two competing perspectives on the evolving IPR regime in China, focusing on the incentives of internal development and the pressures of external legitimacy respectively. We integrate these two perspectives to examine the effects of regional research and development (R&D) investment on the likelihood of foreign plaintiffs winning IPR lawsuits. We identify a direct effect reflecting the evolving economic incentives of host regions, and two mediating pathways that correspond to the legal strategies employed by foreign plaintiffs to apply external legitimacy pressure on host region legal institutions. Our analyses of a sample of 1103 IPR disputes between foreign plaintiffs and local defendants in Chinese courts from 2008 to 2017 provide support to our arguments.     

中美贸易摩擦背景下美国知识产权调查的触发机制及应对策略

美国知识产权调查是由美国企业向美国国际贸易委员会提出,对可能存在的知识产权侵权行为作出裁决的制度。过去十几年间,中国一直是遭受美国知识产权调查最多的国家,严重影响我国企业的出口和产品国际形象。相对而言,中国企业知识产权储备和应对意识严重不足,应诉态度比较消极,缺乏相应的应诉资源,这也让我国出口企业更容易成为美国知识产权调查的对象。应注重提升我国企业的知识产权意识和发挥政府的保障作用,从源头上降低知识产权调查风险。遭遇调查时,注重对应诉资金的筹集与使用、合理选择应诉团队、科学选择抗辩理由,提高胜率。同时积极运用调解、诉讼内并购、反诉等手段,尽可能取得好的结果,减少损失。     

Intellectual property rights,imitation, and development. The effect on cross-border mergers and acquisitions

In this paper, we analyze whether the recent global process of strengthening and harmonization of intellectual property rights (IPRs) affects decisions of cross-border mergers and acquisitions (M&As). We investigate if IPRs have a differential effect across sectors of different technology content and for countries of different development level. Also, we study how imitation abilities of target countries interact with the tightening of IPRs. Using data for the post-TRIPS period (1995–2010), we estimate an extended gravity model to study the bilateral number of M&As, including a measure of the strength of IPRs systems on target countries and a set of control variables usually considered as determinants of M&As. The estimation results verify the gravity structure for M&As and show that IPRs –and enforcement– influence decisions of cross-border M&As in all sectors regardless of their technological content. However, IPRs are more important in countries with high imitation abilities and in sectors of high-technology content. Furthermore, a strengthening of IPRs leads to a larger increase of M&As in developing countries than in developed countries. These results call the attention on the possible implications for least developed economies and challenge the adequacy of a globally harmonized IPRs systems.     

Earnestly Implementing the Campaign and Strengthening the Customs Protection of IPR

The Chinese government is always paying great attention to the Customs IPR Protection .China has established her border measures of intellectual property rights as far as September of 1994.     

Protecting intellectual property: Strategies and recommendations to deter counterfeiting and brand piracy in global markets

Many provisions articulated in the World Trade Organization (WTO) agreements are intended to protect intellectual property rights (IPR). The authors contend that despite these provisions IP pi racy, especially counterfeiting, will continue to be rampant in the foreseeable future. The authors discuss the factors that will continue to make IP piracy problematic and offer proactive solutions to companies interested in protecting IPR should they not have the fullest confidence in the enforcement mechanisms provided by the WTO.     

Quid pro quo and the enforcement of intellectual property rights protection: A bargaining approach

This article models a North–South negotiation where the North provides a quid pro quo in exchange for the strengthening of the enforcement of intellectual property rights (IPR) protection in the South. We show that when Northern and Southern firms compete on quantity in the Southern market, the South's optimal choice is either complete protection or complete violation, irrespective of different levels of IPR protection being available. We show this to depend on the Southern government's valuation of the quid pro quo and the Northern firm's level of technology.     

North-South trade and directed technical change

In a world where poor countries provide weak protection for intellectual property rights (IPRs), market integration shifts technical change in favor of rich nations. Through this channel, free-trade may amplify international wage differences. At the same time, integration with countries where IPRs are weakly protected can slow down the world growth rate. An important implication of these results is that protection of intellectual property is most beneficial in open countries. This prediction, which is novel in the literature, is consistent with evidence from a panel of 53 countries observed in the years 1965-1990. The paper also provides empirical support for the mechanism linking North-South trade to the direction of technical change: an increase in import penetration from low-wage, low-IPRs countries is followed by a sharp fall in R&D investment in a panel of US manufacturing sectors.     

Growth via Intellectual Property Rights Versus Gendered Inequity in Emerging Economies: An Ethical Dilemma for International Business

In this paper, we critique the emergent international normative framework of growth – the knowledge economy. We point out that the standardized character of knowledge economy’s flagship – intellectual property rights (IPRs) – has an adverse impact on women in emerging economies, such as India. Conversely, this impact on women, a significant consumer segment, has a feedback effect in terms of market growth. Conceptually, we analyze the consequences of knowledge economy and standardized IPR through a feminist lens. We extend the analyses by pointing to various contradictions surrounding growth norms; for example, there are inherent contradictions between established “formal” legalistic interpretation of IPR, “soft law” norms of corporate social responsibility, a fluid situation of moral claims of human rights, and different institutional capabilities at the international and domestic level. Consequently, we are able to demonstrate how standard IPR laws fail to deliver equity for all. We argue our case through exploring the growth aspects of the agricultural sector in India and the adverse impact of standard biopatenting on women farmers’ rights (as producers and consumers) and preservation of environment. We suggest that desired gendered equity is better achieved when there is a constellation of actors – private-sector business, the state, and civil-society leaders – working together to ensure a balanced development through tailoring of IPR to local needs.     

中日韩知识产权贸易竞争力比较研究

随着知识产权强国战略的推进,我国的知识产权贸易取得了很大的进展,但与世界知识产权贸易强国相比依然差异巨大。东北亚是全球经济中举足轻重、发展最快的区域之一,而中日韩三国的高新技术、信息技术等产业较为发达。因此,本文对中国、日本及韩国的知识产权贸易竞争力指数进行对比测算,为我国的知识产权贸易发展提出可行性建议。     

与公共健康有关的TRIPS-plus条款研究——兼论国际知识产权立法的双边趋势

在有关TRIPS的谈判中,发达国家未能实现其所有目的,虽屡次试图加强TRIPS的保护水平,却总是成效甚微。鉴于此,双边自由贸易协定,而非多边条约,成为了他们新一轮努力的重点。在这方面,美国无愧于其中"翘楚",其近年所为,对"超TRIPS条款"的扩张起了推波助澜作用。这使发达国家得以规避TRIPS中有利于较不发达国家的规定,并为进一步制定不平等国际规范奠定了基础。本文主要分析了美式FTA中与公共健康有关的超TRIPS条款,以证明上述观点,并提请发展中国家注意国际知识产权立法中的这一双边趋势及其潜在的不利影响。