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Publications
  • November 2015
  • Article
  • Strategic Management Journal

Modularity and Intellectual Property Protection

By: Carliss Y. Baldwin and Joachim Henkel
  • Format:Print
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Abstract

Modularity is a means of partitioning technical knowledge about a product or process. When state-sanctioned intellectual property (IP) rights are ineffective or costly to enforce, modularity can be used to hide information and thus protect IP. We investigate the impact of modularity on IP protection by formally modeling the threat of expropriation by agents. The principal has three options to address this threat: trust, licensing, and paying agents to stay loyal. We show how the principal can influence the value of these options by modularizing the system and by hiring clans of agents, thus exploiting relationships among them. Extensions address screening and signaling in hiring, the effects of an imperfect legal system, and social norms of fairness. We illustrate our arguments with examples from practice.

Keywords

Modularity; Value Appropriation; Relational Contracts; Clans; Intellectual Property

Citation

Baldwin, Carliss Y., and Joachim Henkel. "Modularity and Intellectual Property Protection." Strategic Management Journal 36, no. 11 (November 2015): 1637–1655.
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About The Author

Carliss Y. Baldwin

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More from the Authors
  • Computer-Implemented Methods and Systems for Measuring, Estimating, and Managing Economic Outcomes and Technical Debt in Software Systems and Projects: US Patent 11,126,427 B2 By: Daniel J. Sturtevant, Carliss Baldwin, Alan MacCormack, Sunny Ahn and Sean Gilliland
  • Design Rules, Volume 2: How Technology Shapes Organizations: Chapter 7 The Value Structure of Technologies, Part 2: Strategy without Numbers By: Carliss Y. Baldwin
  • Design Rules, Volume 2: How Technology Shapes Organizations: Chapter 6 The Value Structure of Technologies, Part 1: Mapping Functional Relationships By: Carliss Y. Baldwin
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