The Hidden Costs of Securing Innovation: The Manifold Impacts of Compulsory Invention Secrecy / Daniel P. Gross.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Gross, Daniel P.

Contributor:

National Bureau of Economic Research.

Series:

Working Paper Series (National Bureau of Economic Research) no. w25545.

NBER working paper series no. w25545

Language:

English

Physical Description:

1 online resource: illustrations (black and white);

Other Title:

Consequences of Invention Secrecy

Place of Publication:

Cambridge, Mass. National Bureau of Economic Research 2019.

Summary:

One of the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office's (USPTO) most commanding powers is to compel inventions into secrecy, withholding patent rights and prohibiting disclosure, to prevent technology from leaking to foreign competitors. This paper studies the impacts of compulsory secrecy on firm invention and the wider innovation system. In World War II, USPTO issued secrecy orders to >11,000 patent applications, which it rescinded en masse at the end of the war. Compulsory secrecy caused implicated firms to shift their patenting away from treated classes, with effects persisting through at least 1960. It also restricted commercialization and impeded follow-on innovation. Yet it appears it was effective at keeping sensitive technology out of public view. The results provide insight into the effectiveness of compulsory secrecy as a regulatory strategy and into the roles, and impacts, of formal intellectual property in the innovation system.

Notes:

Print version record

February 2019.