The Globalization of Intellectual Property Rights and Innovation in Services

I review the various interrelationships between innovation in service industries and the need for intellectual property rights (IPR) protection. A number of service sectors engage in significant innovation, particularly in information technologies, the internet, digital entertainment, and financial services, suggesting that IPR are of increasing importance in those areas. Other service sectors have not made much use of IPR to date but emerging patterns of innovation indicates that doing so will become a more central element of commercial strategy. A review of available survey evidence supports these views. I discuss how fundamental principles of IPR may be applied to various services and note certain gaps in policy regimes that should be filled in order to meet the needs of these sectors.

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Notes

That IPR support the development of technology markets is documented convincingly in Arora et al. (2001).

There are a number of detailed recent studies of the nature and extent of innovation in service industries, particularly in Europe. See especially the studies by Akerblom (2002), Hanel (2004), the OECD (2005), and the summaries of the Community Innovation Surveys 2 and 3 in Kanerva et al. (2006) and Fraunhofer Institute (2003). An excellent conceptual overview from a Schumpeterian perspective is provided by van der Have et al. (2007).

Moenius and Trindade (2008) provide a comprehensive analytical review of these concepts and related literature.

The Fraunhofer Institute (2003) report was prepared by a team from four institutions studying European innovation in services. The project was coordinated by Knut Blind of FhG-ISI.

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Authors and Affiliations

1. UCB 256, University of Colorado, Boulder, CO, USA Keith E. Maskus

1. Keith E. Maskus