The smartphone patent war is an unavoidable result of the patent systems that each company must
navigate. In the long-run, it is a necessary business strategy for smartphone companies to engage in, in order to protect and preserve individual companies' intellectual property.
Patent Litigation: A
Smart Business Tactic
None of the companies involved in the smartphone patent war
would be investing the tens of millions of dollars that they spend on defensive
litigation if they had a choice. Each would want to file purely offensive suits
in order to protect their IP while preventing others from utilizing it;
however, due to the nature of suits, each case must have a defendant. As such,
each company in the smartphone industry that claims a reasonable stake must, as
a necessity, be involved in patent litigation and defense.
What effect does this
have on companies and consumers?
Patent litigation expenses are necessary to protect profits
and intellectual property. Without strong IP defense, companies that would
normally have monopolies on their product or technology would earn an
unjustifiable return on their investments, mitigating the incentives that they
have to invent new technologies. With the ability to retain and monopolize IP,
companies can reap the full benefits from their investments without facing competition.
Companies will have strong incentives to innovate, invent,
and improve with strong IP protection. As a result, consumers will benefit from
the improved technologies that such companies will be able to produce. The smartphone
patent war is a necessary evil of the industry, and in the long run will result
in increased incentives for innovation in the smartphone industry as it sets a
precedent for strong IP defense in the future.
I further discuss my thoughts on this topic at the following link:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j1dd0ax_HJ4
I further discuss my thoughts on this topic at the following link:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j1dd0ax_HJ4
It's true that patent litigation in the long run will drive more innovation as corporations have the incentive to protect their intellectual property.
ReplyDeleteI would try to imagine if there was no such thing called patent lawsuit, what could possibly go wrong? As you mentioned in the post that companies don't face the competition as they do not have incentive to invent new technology. What if, say, Samsung cloned iPhone and selling it at a lower price, wouldn't this be considered as competition?
However, this already is happening with China disregarding the patenting business, Xiaomi started with producing better quality iPhone-like mobile devices to gain traction. And it succeed very well that it is trying out something different. I would call this a kind of innovation, but started with copying other's work.