Competition, Innovation and Intellectual Property

The following post appears courtesy of the Antitrust Division. Today the Department of Justice’s Antitrust Division is recognizing the 12th annual World Intellectual Property Day. The Antitrust Division recognizes the vital role innovation and intellectual property play in our economy. Innovation drives economic growth, creates jobs, and enhances American competitiveness in a global economy. Innovation benefits American consumers because it leads to new and enhanced products and services. The successful promotion of innovation and creativity requires a both competitive markets and strong intellectual property rights. To reward those that make investments and take risks to innovate, strong intellectual property rights protect their inventions and ideas from unauthorized infringement. Antitrust enforcement, however, remains critical to ensure that intellectual property rights are not abused to limit competition. Competitive pressures force companies to continue innovating and creating additional intellectual property. During a speech earlier this week at the Brookings Institution, Acting Assistant Attorney General Sharis A. Pozen spoke about a recent set of patent acquisitions that highlight the important intersection between intellectual property rights and competition law:

Our efforts to protect competition and ensure innovators obtain intellectual property protections are ongoing. We continue to review mergers and monitor the use of intellectual property rights in industries that effect consumers to ensure that the right balance is achieved between competition law and intellectual property law.