Intellectual Property Rights and Innovation: Evidence from the Human Genome
Do intellectual property (IP) rights on existing technologies hinder subsequent innovation? Using newly-collected data on the sequencing of the human genome by the public Human Genome Project and the private rm Celera, this paper estimates the impact of Celera's gene-level IP on subsequent...
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| Format: | Article |
| Language: | en_US |
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University of Chicago Press
2013
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| Online Access: | http://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/78858 https://orcid.org/0000-0003-4364-1505 |
| Summary: | Do intellectual property (IP) rights on existing technologies hinder subsequent
innovation? Using newly-collected data on the sequencing of the human genome by
the public Human Genome Project and the private rm Celera, this paper estimates
the impact of Celera's gene-level IP on subsequent scienti c research and product
development. Genes initially sequenced by Celera were held with IP for up to two
years, but moved into the public domain once re-sequenced by the public e ort.
Across a range of empirical speci cations, I nd evidence that Celera's IP led to
reductions in subsequent scienti c research and product development on the order of
20 to 30 percent. Taken together, these results suggest that Celera's short-term IP
had persistent negative e ects on subsequent innovation relative to a counterfactual
of Celera genes having always been in the public domain. |
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