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For decades, industry lobbyists and governments have been mounting pressure on other countries to offer stronger protection for foreign owned intellectual property. This paper seeks to sow dissent among those who feel that the NAFTA and TRIPS agreements represent the triumph of strong intellectual property rights over domestic policy-making alternatives. Focusing on patent law, in particular, this article argues that there are a wide range of policy options open to patent granting countries which both circumscribe patent holder's rights and comply with TRIPS and NAFTA. More specifically, the author argues that TRIPS and NAFTA signatories continue to enjoy relatively broad discretion to legislate compulsory licensing and mandatory local working conditions.

Abstract Compared with the social optimum, a monopolist usually sells too little. This result seemingly includes the case of a lab that licences its patented cost innovation: Katz and Shapiro (1986) find 'conditions under which [the lab] will issue fewer than the socially optimal number of licences.' However, I find instead that its incentives can be socially too high; the monopoly seller may sell too much. For example, it can be profit maximizing to sell several licences, while it is socially optimal that none is sold.

This is the author accepted manuscript. The final version is available from Elsevier via the DOI in this record ; We examine the relation between acquirer and target firm ownership and the probability of a cross-border deal involving patents. By focusing on M&A deals involving intangible assets, we are better positioned to analyze technology sales. We show how different owners on the acquirer and the target side, and their relative position, are related to the decision to conduct a domestic versus cross-border transaction involving patent sales. We find that acquirer bank and fund ownership have very little association with cross-border M&A transactions involving patent sales. However, risk-averse family owners and insiders in an acquirer firm are negatively related to the probability if they are minority shareholders. In contrast, family owners and insiders have a positive association if they are the largest shareholder. We also illustrate how target owners shape cross-border M&A decisions. Family and fund owners in target firms are negatively related to the probability of a cross-border M&A transaction involving patent sales. This is attributable to the fact that the valuation of intangible assets can be overly complicated with foreign acquirers. Thus, target owners can likely secure better deals domestically. ; European Union Horizon 2020 ; National Science Center, Poland