Footnote:
Nach Informationen von SSRN wurde die ursprüngliche Fassung des Dokuments August 28, 2021 erstellt
Description:
This article explores whether and how we may leverage antitrust law to calibrate the exploitation of intellectual property (“IP”) rights – e.g., IP licensing –to facilitate needed access to essential technologies. The motivation of the article is to help developing countries find an effective way to address their complaints that owners of IP-protected technologies refuse to license needed technologies or charge unfairly high prices. The article concludes that leveraging antitrust law to address these typical challenges developing countries experience in accessing essential technologies may be more effective than attempting to change the IP regime governed by negotiated and established multilateral instruments.The article addresses the normative question of whether we should leverage antitrust law to improve access to essential technologies and the applied question of how we may do so. In answering the first question, the article explores the conceptual linkages among IP, antitrust law, and access to essential technologies, examining the diverse approaches toward the IP-antitrust interface by multilateral, regional, bilateral, and jurisdictional instruments. In answering the second question, the article compares courses taken by three major antitrust law regimes – the U.S., the EU, and China – toward the IP-antitrust interface, refusal to license, the essential facilities doctrine, and excessive pricing. The article suggests a possible approach in using antitrust law to improve access to essential technologies and proposes corresponding guidelines for designing antitrust law provisions to achieve this purpose. The article discusses necessary balancing considerations in the implementation. It also considers the barriers developing countries need to overcome for the implementation