The abuse of intellectual property rights and regulations in China: a law and economic analysis

From the institutional point of view, the legal system of IPR (intellectual property right, hereafter, IPR) is one of incentive institutions of innovation and it plays very important role in the development of economy. According to the law, the owner of the IPR enjoy a kind of exclusive right to use his IP(intellectual property, hereafter, IP), in other words, he enjoys a kind of legal monopoly position in the market. How to well protect the IPR and at the same time to regulate the abuse of IPR is very interested topic in this knowledge-orientated market and it is the basic research question in this dissertation. In this paper, by way of comparing study and by way of law and economic analyses, and based on the Austrian Economics School’s theories, the writer claims that there is no any contradiction between the IPR and competition law. However, in this new economy (high-technology industries), there is really probability of the owner of IPR to abuse his dominant position. And with the characteristics of the new economy, such as, the high rates of innovation, “instant scalability”, network externality and lock-in effects, the IPR “will vest the dominant undertakings with the power not just to monopolize the market but to shift such power from one market to another, to create strong barriers to enter and, in so doing, granting the perpetuation of such dominance for quite a long time.”1 Therefore, in order to keep the order of market, to vitalize the competition and innovation, and to benefit the customer, in EU and US, it is common ways to apply the competition law to regulate the IPR abuse. In Austrian Economic School perspective, especially the Schumpeterian theories, the innovation/competition/monopoly and entrepreneurship are inter-correlated, therefore, we should apply the dynamic antitrust model based on the AES theories to analysis the relationship between the IPR and competition law. China is still a developing country with relative not so high ability of innovation. Therefore, at present, to protect the IPR and to make good use of the incentive mechanism of IPR legal system is the first important task for Chinese government to do. However, according to the investigation reports,2 based on their IPR advantage and capital advantage, some multinational companies really obtained the dominant or monopoly market position in some aspects of some industries, and there are some IPR abuses conducted by such multinational companies. And then, the Chinese government should be paying close attention to regulate any IPR abuse. However, how to effectively regulate the IPR abuse by way of competition law in Chinese situation, from the law and economic theories’ perspective, from the legislation perspective, and from the judicial practice perspective, there is a long way for China to go!

Diritti umani e diritto alla salute - la questione dell’accesso ai farmaci come un problema di Giustizia Globale

Riconosciuto il problema dell’accesso ai farmaci come un problema di giustizia globale, la dissertazione, da un lato, è incentrata sullo studio dei diritti umani e sul diritto alla salute da una prospettiva giusfilosofica e, dall’altro, è finalizzata ad analizzare la disciplina brevettuale internazionale, sia approfondendo gli interessi realmente in gioco, sia studiando la struttura economica del brevetto stesso. Si è cercato quindi di guardare a tali interessi da una nuova prospettiva, ipotizzando una gerarchia di valori che sia completa e coerente con gli obiettivi che la dottrina, la giurisprudenza, nonché il diritto internazionale formalmente enunciano. Il progetto di ricerca vuole, in definitiva, arrivare a proporre nuove soluzioni giuridiche al problema dell’accesso ai farmaci. La dissertazione svolge pertanto uno studio critico della proposta di Thomas Pogge, di natura politica e giuridica e sorretta da istanze filosofiche, volta alla soluzione del problema dell’accesso ai farmaci, i.e. l’Health Impact Fund (HIF). Proposta che pone radicalmente in discussione, anche concretamente, il dogma del monopolio concesso con la privativa quale ricompensa per i costi di R&D sostenuti dai titolari dei brevetti e che pone, invece, l’accento sull’effettivo impatto sulla salute globale di ogni singola invenzione. Analizzandone approfonditamente gli aspetti più rilevanti, si passano poi in rassegna, criticamente, le proposte, alternative o di riforma, del sistema di proprietà intellettuale, volte al miglioramento dell’accesso ai farmaci; a tal proposito, si propone quindi una riforma transitoria della disciplina brevettuale, c.d. Trading Time for Space (TTS), che prevede un allungamento temporale dell’esclusiva brevettuale (Time) in cambio della vendita da parte del titolare della privativa del farmaco ad un prezzo accessibile nei Paesi in via di sviluppo (Space).

Essays in Industrial Organization and Information Technology

Chapter 1 studies how consumers’ switching costs affect the pricing and profits of firms competing in two-sided markets such as Apple and Google in the smartphone market. When two-sided markets are dynamic – rather than merely static – I show that switching costs lower the first-period price if network externalities are strong, which is in contrast to what has been found in one-sided markets. By contrast, switching costs soften price competition in the initial period if network externalities are weak and consumers are more patient than the platforms. Moreover, an increase in switching costs on one side decreases the first-period price on the other side. Chapter 2 examines firms’ incentives to invest in local and flexible resources when demand is uncertain and correlated. I find that market power of the monopolist providing flexible resources distorts investment incentives, while competition mitigates them. The extent of improvement depends critically on demand correlation and the cost of capacity: under social optimum and monopoly, if the flexible resource is cheap, the relationship between investment and correlation is positive, and if it is costly, the relationship becomes negative; under duopoly, the relationship is positive. The analysis also sheds light on some policy discussions in markets such as cloud computing. Chapter 3 develops a theory of sequential investments in cybersecurity. The regulator can use safety standards and liability rules to increase security. I show that the joint use of an optimal standard and a full liability rule leads to underinvestment ex ante and overinvestment ex post. Instead, switching to a partial liability rule can correct the inefficiencies. This suggests that to improve security, the regulator should encourage not only firms, but also consumers to invest in security.

Essays in nonlinear pricing and rent seeking

This thesis consists of three self-contained essays on nonlinear pricing and rent-seeking. In the first chapter of the thesis, I provide new theoretical insights about non-linear pricing in monopoly and common agency by combining the principal-agent framework with other-regarding preferences. I introduce a new theoretical model that separately characterizes status-seeker and inequity-averse buyers. I show how the buyer’s optimal choice of quality and market inefficiency change when the buyer has other-regarding preferences. In the second chapter, I find the optimal productive rent-seeking and sabotaging efforts when the prize is endogenous. I show that due to the existence of endogeneity, sabotaging the productive rent-seeking efforts causes sabotaging the endogenous part of the prize, which can affect the rent-seeking efforts. Moreover, I introduce social preferences into my model and characterize symmetric productive rent-seeking and sabotaging efforts. In the last chapter, I propose a new theoretical model regarding information disclosure with Bayesian persuasion in rent-seeking contests when the efforts are productive. I show that under one-sided incomplete information, information disclosure decision depends on both the marginal costs of efforts and the marginal benefit of aggregate exerted effort. I find that since the efforts are productive and add a positive surplus on the fixed rent, my model narrows down the conditions for the information disclosure compared to the exogenous model. Under the two-sided incomplete information case, I observe that there is a non-monotone relationship between optimal effort and posterior beliefs. Thus, it might be difficult to conclude whether a contest organizer should disclose any information to contestants.

Società a partecipazione pubblica nel mercato dell'energia elettrica tra concorrenza e obblighi di servizio pubblico

La disciplina pubblicistica dell’energia elettrica presenta specificità rilevanti rispetto ad altri settori della regolazione economica. Il settore energetico si caratterizza infatti per una complessa regolazione, dovuta sia alle specificità dell’oggetto della disciplina, cioè l’energia elettrica come bene immateriale, sia alla molteplicità degli interessi pubblici coinvolti, che si innestano su fallimenti di mercato (i.e. il sistema a rete non duplicabile), sia agli obiettivi di politica internazionale e di sicurezza nazionale, che intercettano delicate interrelazioni con l’ambiente e il clima, come tutelati nel Green Deal, nelle normative europee e nazionali e negli accordi internazionali sulla decarbonizzazione e sullo sviluppo sostenibile. Inoltre, la filiera elettrica è “verticalmente integrata”, cioè suddivisa in attività diverse, cioè la produzione, il dispacciamento, la trasmissione, la distribuzione, la vendita all’ingrosso e al dettaglio di energia. Queste sono esercitate in regimi di mercato differenti: monopolio naturale (dovuto al carattere sub-additivo dei costi) per il dispacciamento, la trasmissione e la distribuzione di energia; libera concorrenza per la produzione e la vendita. L’esigenza di assicurare la concorrenza nel mercato energetico si contempera con la necessità di rispettare gli obblighi di servizio pubblico, in un delicato bilanciamento tra esigenze contrapposte. La Direttiva U.E. del 13 luglio 2009 n. 2009/72/Cee, all’art. 3, qualifica infatti la fornitura di energia elettrica come un servizio universale, attribuendo agli utenti il diritto di ricevere la fornitura e di mantenere prezzi ragionevoli, facilmente e chiaramente comparabili, trasparenti e non discriminatori.