I was browsing FossPatents blog and I saw one of his posts from yesterday March 5 about Competition Policy International (CPI) publishing a paper called "Standard Setting Organization's (SSOs) Can Help Solve the Standard Essential Patent (SEP) licensing problem. And, being relevant to the FTC, the FTC's Director of their Bureau of Economics coauthored with a former Chief Economist of the Antitrust division within the US DOJ as well as with the European Commission's Directorate-General. Thus, the three authors share a wealth of experience in this field and are experienced economists.
Within the recently published paper, the authors claim that their suggestions will "greatly improve efficiency in patent licensing" because of the current problem if SEP holders trying to get FRAND (fair, reasonable, and non-discriminatory) royalties and licensing fees out of other companies. The main goals of their reforms, according to the blog post, are "less hold-up, lower litigation costs, and more innovation."
Specifically, to achieve these aforementioned goals, they have 4 main suggestions that come out of their paper. Briefly, the first has to do with FRAND commitments becoming weaker or more vague after the sale of a patent. The second aims to ""include a process that is faster and lower cost for
determining a F/RAND rate, or adjudicating disputes over F/RAND, than litigation." The third has to do with switching to cash-only option versus cross licensing. Lastly, the fourth hopes to have a more formal process through which people can discuss FRAND disputes without the threat of injunction. I will expand on these points and on the blogpost in my Youtube blog.
Article is here: http://www.fosspatents.com/2013/03/chief-economists-of-eu-commission-and.html
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