Unpacking Patent Assertion Entities (PAEs)
Unpacking Patent Assertion Entities (PAEs)
复制标题
拆开专利主张实体 (PAE)
DOI：
10.2139/ssrn.2346381
复制
发表时间：
2014
影响因子：
1.3
通讯作者：
David L. Schwartz
中科院分区：
文献类型：
--
作者：
C. Cotropia;J. Kesan;David L. Schwartz
There is tremendous interest in a certain type of patent litigant — the often-called non-practicing entity ("NPE"), patent assertion entity ("PAE"), patent monetization entity ("PME"), or simply patent troll. These NPEs are the subject of a recent GAO report, a possible FTC investigation, pending legislation before Congress, and even comments from the President of the United States. All of this commentary and activity centers on whether NPE participation in patent litigation, and the patent system in general, is detrimental or beneficial to society. But the fundamental barrier to understanding the current debate is the lack of granular and transparent data on NPE litigation behavior. Accordingly, we personally hand-coded all patent holder litigants from calendar years 2010 and 2012, and we are releasing this data to the public. In our coding, we drill down and finely classify the nature of the litigants beyond the simple NPE or non-NPE definitions. Releasing this data to the public that unpacks the definition of NPE can provide better illumination to policy makers, researchers, and others interested in the patent litigation system. The data reveals a much lower percentage of litigation brought by patent holding companies than other studies, finding no explosion in NPE litigation between 2010 and 2012. Instead, we find that most differences between the years — an increase in the number of patent holding companies and individual inventor suits — is likely explained by a change in the joinder rules adopted in 2011 as part of the America Invents Act.
