Intellectual property rights, international licensing and foreign direct investment

Abstract

This paper develops a North-South trade model to examine the effect of the enforcement of intellectual property rights (IPR) in the South on inward foreign direct investment (FDI) by taking into account international licensing and the informational advantage of FDI. The focus of this paper is on the strategic influence of international licensing on the optimal entry mode of firm N. The main findings of this paper are as follows. First, the optimal entry mode for firm N in the absence of IPR protection is FDI when the innovation size is large but the variance of demand and the fixed setup cost are small, while selecting exporting otherwise. Second, the enforcement of IPR in the South can promote FDI when the innovation size is small, while discouraging FDI when the innovation size is moderate and large. Third, the enforcement of IPR protection will most likely decrease the total output and the welfare level in the South under international licensing, while the reverse may occur as a result of changing the firm N’s entry mode from FDI to exporting.