The Disciplinary Effect of Post-Grant Review - Causal Evidence from European Patent Opposition

41 Pages Posted: 25 Apr 2019

See all articles by Markus Nagler

Markus Nagler

University of Erlangen-Nuremberg-Friedrich Alexander Universität Erlangen Nürnberg

Stefan Sorg

Max Planck Institute for Innovation and Competition

Date Written: 2019

Abstract

We study the causal impact of invalidating marginally valid patents during post-grant opposition at the European Patent Office on affected inventors’ subsequent patenting. We exploit exogenous variation in invalidation by leveraging the participation of a patent’s original examiner in the opposition division as an instrument. We find a disciplinary effect of invalidation: Affected inventors file 20% fewer patent applications in the decade after the decision. This effect is entirely driven by a reduction in low-quality filings, i.e., filings that examiners associate with prior art that threatens the application’s novelty or inventive step. We do not observe shifts into national patenting.

Keywords: inventors, marginal patents, patent invalidation, patent opposition, post-grant review, EPO, innovation

JEL Classification: O310, O340

Suggested Citation

Nagler, Markus and Sorg, Stefan, The Disciplinary Effect of Post-Grant Review - Causal Evidence from European Patent Opposition (2019). CESifo Working Paper No. 7599, Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=3377696 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.3377696

Markus Nagler (Contact Author)

University of Erlangen-Nuremberg-Friedrich Alexander Universität Erlangen Nürnberg ( email )

Schloßplatz 4
Erlangen, DE Bavaria 91054
Germany

Stefan Sorg

Max Planck Institute for Innovation and Competition ( email )

Marstallplatz 1
Munich, Bayern 80539
Germany

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