IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/cmi/wpaper/cemi-workingpaper-2008-005.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Universities and access to medicines: What is the optimal ‘humanitarian license’?

Author

Listed:
  • Annamaria Conti

    (Chaire en Economie et Management de l'Innovation, Collège du Management de la Technologie, Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne)

  • Patrick Gaulé

    (Chaire en Economie et Management de l'Innovation, Collège du Management de la Technologie, Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne)

Abstract

This paper seeks to add an economic contribution to the current debate on using university licensing contracts to improve access to medicines in developing countries. We build a simple model in which we have a university licensing out an academic invention to a profit-maximizing pharmaceutical company. We compare three different types of licensing contracts that the university might use to enhance access to pharmaceuticals in the South: (1) an exclusive license limited to the North; (2) an exclusive license worldwide with a price cap in the South; and (3) an exclusive license worldwide with a price cap in the South and a clause specifying that the licensee would lose its exclusivity in the South if it does not supply the Southern market. We show that in a simple model with asymmetric information on production costs the latter type of contract dominates the two others.

Suggested Citation

  • Annamaria Conti & Patrick Gaulé, 2008. "Universities and access to medicines: What is the optimal ‘humanitarian license’?," CEMI Working Papers cemi-workingpaper-2008-00, Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne, Collège du Management de la Technologie, Management of Technology and Entrepreneurship Institute, Chaire en Economie et Management de l'Innovation.
    • Handle: RePEc:cmi:wpaper:cemi-workingpaper-2008-005
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://cdm-repec.epfl.ch/cmi-wpaper/cemi-workingpaper-2008-005.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Jensen, Richard A. & Thursby, Jerry G. & Thursby, Marie C., 2003. "Disclosure and licensing of University inventions: 'The best we can do with the s**t we get to work with'," International Journal of Industrial Organization, Elsevier, vol. 21(9), pages 1271-1300, November.
    2. Thursby, Jerry G & Jensen, Richard & Thursby, Marie C, 2001. "Objectives, Characteristics and Outcomes of University Licensing: A Survey of Major U.S. Universities," The Journal of Technology Transfer, Springer, vol. 26(1-2), pages 59-72, January.
    3. Donald Siegel & David Waldman & Albert Link, 1999. "Assessing the Impact of Organizational Practices on the Productivity of University Technology Transfer Offices: An Exploratory Study," NBER Working Papers 7256, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Heidrun C. Hoppe & Emre Ozdenoren, 2002. "Intermediation in Innovation," CIG Working Papers FS IV 02-11, Wissenschaftszentrum Berlin (WZB), Research Unit: Competition and Innovation (CIG).
    2. Debackere, Koenraad & Veugelers, Reinhilde, 2005. "The role of academic technology transfer organizations in improving industry science links," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 34(3), pages 321-342, April.
    3. Christoph Kober, 2010. "Enhancing Knowledge-Based Regional Economic Development: Potentials and Barriers for Technology Transfer Offices," NEURUS papers neurusp139, NEURUS - Network of European and US Regional and Urban Studies.
    4. Pluvia Zuniga, 2011. "The State of Patenting at Research Institutions in Developing Countries: Policy Approaches and Practices," WIPO Economic Research Working Papers 04, World Intellectual Property Organization - Economics and Statistics Division, revised Dec 2011.
    5. Samantha Bradley & Christopher Hayter & Albert Link, 2013. "Proof of Concept Centers in the United States: an exploratory look," The Journal of Technology Transfer, Springer, vol. 38(4), pages 349-381, August.
    6. Celestine Chukumba & Richard Jensen, 2005. "University Invention, Entrepreneurship, and Start-Ups," NBER Working Papers 11475, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    7. Bradley, Samantha R. & Hayter, Christopher S. & Link, Albert N., 2013. "Models and Methods of University Technology Transfer," UNCG Economics Working Papers 13-10, University of North Carolina at Greensboro, Department of Economics.
    8. Battaglia, Daniele & Landoni, Paolo & Rizzitelli, Francesco, 2017. "Organizational structures for external growth of University Technology Transfer Offices: An explorative analysis," Technological Forecasting and Social Change, Elsevier, vol. 123(C), pages 45-56.
    9. Richard Jensen, 2012. "University Startups and Entrepreneurship: New Data, New Results," Working Papers 009, University of Notre Dame, Department of Economics, revised Jul 2012.
    10. Andreas Panagopoulos & Elias Carayannis, 2013. "A policy for enhancing the disclosure of university faculty invention," The Journal of Technology Transfer, Springer, vol. 38(3), pages 341-347, June.
    11. Jisun Kim & Tugrul Daim, 2014. "A new approach to measuring time-lags in technology licensing: study of U.S. academic research institutions," The Journal of Technology Transfer, Springer, vol. 39(5), pages 748-773, October.
    12. Johnson, William H.A., 2011. "Managing university technology development using organizational control theory," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 40(6), pages 842-852, July.
    13. Foray, Dominique & Lissoni, Francesco, 2010. "University Research and Public–Private Interaction," Handbook of the Economics of Innovation, in: Bronwyn H. Hall & Nathan Rosenberg (ed.), Handbook of the Economics of Innovation, edition 1, volume 1, chapter 0, pages 275-314, Elsevier.
    14. Hottenrott, Hanna & Thorwarth, Susanne, 2010. "Industry funding of university research and scientific productivity," ZEW Discussion Papers 10-105, ZEW - Leibniz Centre for European Economic Research.
    15. Anja Schoen & Bruno Pottelsberghe de la Potterie & Joachim Henkel, 2014. "Governance typology of universities’ technology transfer processes," The Journal of Technology Transfer, Springer, vol. 39(3), pages 435-453, June.
    16. Stefan Krabel & Alexander Schacht, 2012. "The Influence of Leadership on Academic Scientists' Propensity to Commercialize Research Findings," Jena Economics Research Papers 2012-027, Friedrich-Schiller-University Jena.
    17. Nicola Baldini & Rosa Grimaldi & Maurizio Sobrero, 2007. "To patent or not to patent? A survey of Italian inventors on motivations, incentives, and obstacles to university patenting," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 70(2), pages 333-354, February.
    18. Richard A. Jensen & Marie C. Thursby, 2004. "Patent Licensing and the Research University," NBER Working Papers 10758, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    19. Thursby, Jerry G. & Thursby, Marie C., 2011. "Faculty participation in licensing: Implications for research," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 40(1), pages 20-29, February.
    20. Isabel Maria Bodas Freitas & Aldo Geuna & Federica Rossi, 2011. "University–Industry Interactions: The Unresolved Puzzle," Chapters, in: Cristiano Antonelli (ed.), Handbook on the Economic Complexity of Technological Change, chapter 11, Edward Elgar Publishing.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    technology licensing; university licensing; access to medicines;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • L3 - Industrial Organization - - Nonprofit Organizations and Public Enterprise
    • O32 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Innovation; Research and Development; Technological Change; Intellectual Property Rights - - - Management of Technological Innovation and R&D
    • O34 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Innovation; Research and Development; Technological Change; Intellectual Property Rights - - - Intellectual Property and Intellectual Capital
    • O38 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Innovation; Research and Development; Technological Change; Intellectual Property Rights - - - Government Policy

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:cmi:wpaper:cemi-workingpaper-2008-005. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Julio Raffo (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/cepflch.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.