Intellectual Property Protection Mechanisms Research Articles

Identifying Appropriate Intellectual Property Protection Mechanisms for Machine Learning Models: A Systematization of Watermarking, Fingerprinting, Model Access, and Attacks.

The commercial use of machine learning (ML) is spreading; at the same time, ML models are becoming more complex and more expensive to train, which makes intellectual property protection (IPP) of trained models a pressing issue. Unlike other domains that can build on a solid understanding of the threats, attacks, and defenses available to protect their IP, ML-related research in this regard is still very fragmented. This is also due to a missing unified view as well as a common taxonomy of these aspects. In this article, we systematize our findings on IPP in ML while focusing on threats and attacks identified and defenses proposed at the time of writing. We develop a comprehensive threat model for IP in ML, categorizing attacks and defenses within a unified and consolidated taxonomy, thus bridging research from both the ML and security communities.

Analysis of Green Intellectual Property Issues and Countermeasures from the Perspective of International Law

As an advanced form of productivity driven by green technological innovation, there exists a natural fit and close connection between new quality productivity and green intellectual property rights. Legal protection is the cornerstone of the development of new productivity, in which the comprehensive protection of intellectual property rights is particularly crucial: green intellectual property rights, as a key force to adhere to sustainable development and promote scientific and technological progress and economic growth, has a central role to play in incentivizing environmental protection as the core of independent innovation, thus becoming an indispensable institutional guarantee for the development of new productivity. This institutional guarantee ensures the legitimate rights and interests of innovation achievements, and is a powerful driving force and a long-term solution for the continuous progress of productive forces. At present, the field of intellectual property cooperation is encountering diversified challenges and problems: the unilateralization caused by some developed countries, the rigidity of international rules on intellectual property, the stagnation behind the digital age, and the imbalance in the distribution of existing international benefits of intellectual property, which should be paid close attention to. In order to effectively promote green technological innovation and escort the green intellectual property protection system to a stable and far-reaching future, countries and enterprises should face the current challenges rationally, correctly understand the differences and conflicts between green intellectual property rights and ordinary intellectual property rights, gain a deeper understanding of the existing relevant international law foundations, and promptly solve the green intellectual property rights issues, improve the relevant international conventions and treaties, strengthen the coordination and cooperation of international organizations, and establish a fair and reasonable green technology patent protection mechanism. fair and reasonable patent protection mechanism for green technology. Only when countries join hands to improve the green intellectual property protection mechanism, jointly combat transnational infringement and maintain a fair market competition environment can the legitimate rights and interests of innovators be safeguarded.

FEATURES OF INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY PROTECTION IN POLAND

In today's interconnected global economy, the protection of intellectual property (IP) is crucial for fostering innovation and securing the economic interests of creators and inventors. As Poland continues to develop within Europe's dynamic market, understanding its IP protection mechanisms is essential for both domestic and international stakeholders. This article aims to provide a comprehensive analysis of the multifaceted features of intellectual property protection in Poland, assessing its legal underpinnings, recent reforms, and broader economic and cultural impacts. Employing a diverse research methodology, this study combines a detailed literature review, documentary analysis, and comparative studies. The literature review examines existing Polish IP laws, scholarly articles, and international treaties, while the documentary analysis includes reports from Polish governmental agencies and reviews of judicial decisions shaping IP enforcement in Poland. The research highlights Poland’s robust legal framework aligned with EU standards, yet points to challenges in enforcement, particularly regarding digital piracy and judicial inefficiencies. Solutions such as specialized IP courts and enhanced online IP enforcement mechanisms are discussed. The role of various governmental and non-governmental bodies in raising public awareness and facilitating IP education is also emphasized as crucial for improving the overall IP protection landscape. The article suggests that while Poland has established a solid foundation for IP protection, continuous adaptation and improvement are necessary to address emerging challenges effectively. To improve the legal frameworks, invest in technology-driven enforcement tools, and foster a culture of respect for intellectual property among the public. These measures will protect creators' rights and strengthen Poland's reputation as a hub for innovation and creativity within the European Union.

Open Innovation Intellectual Property Risk Maturity Model: An Approach to Measure Intellectual Property Risks of Software Firms Engaged in Open Innovation

Open innovation (OI) is key to sustainable product development and is increasingly gaining significance as the preferred model of innovation across industries. When compared to closed innovation, the protection of intellectual property (IP) that is created in open innovation is complex. For organisations engaging in OI, a sound IP management policy focusing on IP risk reduction plays a significant role in ensuring their sustained growth. Assessing the risks that are involved in IP management will enable firms to devise appropriate IP management strategies, which would ensure sufficient protection of an IP that is created in an OI model. Studies indicate that the risks which are associated with IP and risk management processes also vary with company segments that range from start-ups to micro, small, medium, and large organisations. This paper proposes an open innovation IP risk assessment model to compute the open innovation intellectual property risk score (OIIPRS) by employing an analytic hierarchy process. The OIIPRS indicates the IP risk levels of an organisation when it engages in open innovation with other organisations. The factors contributing to IP risk are identified and further classified as configurable IP risk factors, and the impact of these factors for the various company segments is also factored in when computing the OIIPRS. Further, an OI IP risk maturity model (OIIPRMM) is proposed. This model depicts the IP risk maturity of organisations based on the computed OIIPRS on an IP risk continuum, which categorises firms into five levels of IP risk maturity. The software firms can make use of the OIIPRMM to assess the level of IP risk and adopt proactive IP protection mechanisms while collaborating with other organisations.

A survey on security analysis of machine learning-oriented hardware and software intellectual property

Intellectual Property (IP) includes ideas, innovations, methodologies, works of authorship (viz., literary and artistic works), emblems, brands, images, etc. This property is intangible since it is pertinent to the human intellect. Therefore, IP entities are indisputably vulnerable to infringements and modifications without the owner’s consent. IP protection regulations have been deployed and are still in practice, including patents, copyrights, contracts, trademarks, trade secrets, etc., to address these challenges. Unfortunately, these protections are insufficient to keep IP entities from being changed or stolen without permission. As for this, some IPs require hardware IP protection mechanisms, and others require software IP protection techniques. To secure these IPs, researchers have explored the domain of Intellectual Property Protection (IPP) using different approaches. In this paper, we discuss the existing IP rights and concurrent breakthroughs in the field of IPP research; provide discussions on hardware IP and software IP attacks and defense techniques; summarize different applications of IP protection; and lastly, identify the challenges and future research prospects in hardware and software IP security.

NAVIGATING THE COMPLEXITIES OF IP IN AGRICULTURE: MILESTONES AND CHALLENGES

The adoption of the Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS,) by the World Trade Organization (WTO) propelled the member countries towards the realization of the need to maintain certain minimum standards of protection for intellectual properties. Today, Intellectual Property (IP) has suffused through all spheres of our lives. It holds immense significance in boosting the economies of several nations. There is hardly any sector that has remained untouched by it. IP protection was not given much recognition in the agricultural sector. But, with time, considering the varied aspects of this dynamic and vast sector, IP has also yielded new tones from time to time. The protection mechanisms under the IP regime have taken different shapes for providing suitable protection to the various aspects of the agricultural sector. At present, we have several IP rights recognized in the sphere of agriculture, including, Farmers’ Rights, Breeders’ Rights, Community Rights, right over the protection of Traditional Knowledge, Right to Access and Benefit Sharing (ABS), etc. With this paper, the authors seek to delve into all the IP protection mechanisms traversing the wide-ranging dimensions of the agricultural sector. This article is an attempt at investigating: (i) the milestones which led up to the current scenario of IP protection in agriculture; (ii) the role that is played by Intellectual Property in strengthening & fortifying the agricultural sector, and (iii) the issues related to IP in Agriculture. An attempt has also been made to explore all the initiatives taken up globally to protect IP in Agriculture, along with the prospective measures that can be taken to address the prevailing issues.

Unveiling the relationships among intellectual property strategies, protection mechanisms and outbound open innovation

Many articles in the open innovation literature studied the link between intellectual property protection mechanisms and openness, obtaining contrasting results. This paper bridges the literature on protection mechanisms and the one on intellectual property strategy. It leverages three high‐level intellectual property strategies—defensive, collaborative and impromptu—recently defined in the literature to identify how they entail different intellectual property protection mechanisms and approaches to outbound open innovation. The article advances that defensive, collaborative and impromptu are characterizing factors of intellectual property strategies. An exploratory analysis of 73 manufacturing firms allowed identifying five intellectual property strategies: defensive, purposely defensive, collaborative, developing impromptu and impromptu. The article describes their differences in intellectual property protection mechanisms and outbound open innovation. Furthermore, a fuzzy‐set qualitative comparative analysis identifies the optimal combination of formal, semiformal and informal intellectual property protection mechanisms to nurture outbound open innovation. The results are discussed in view of the extant literature, and implications for scholars and practitioners are presented.

Features of intellectual property protection mechanisms on the example of orphan drugs circulation

Objective: to study features of intellectual property protection mechanisms on the example of drugs for the treatment of rare (orphan) diseases.Material and methods. Analysis of pharmaceutical market data was performed with the DSM Group analytical database. The approach proposed by the Russian Federal Industrial Property Service was used for creating patent landscape. The method supposes conducting a patent search and analysis of the documents found for date of filing, office (country) of filing, applicant, as well as analysis of the patent activity (dynamics) for the subject, in this case, for orphan drugs having a defined structure.Results. We proposed the complex conclusions to increase national drug safety. Intellectual property limitations for importing countries such as data exclusivity, do not allow to reproduce clinical trials, which leads to non-disclosure of medical data to all parties – medical society and patients, all other market participants, including local pharmaceutical producers. Current intellectual property restrictions conceal crucial data from medical and patient society and other market players and affect accuracy of diagnosis and treatment. Along with outstanding cost of new therapies it causes enormous budget burden for the healthcare system and prevents the introduction of objective criteria in the appointment and use of medicines. Prior to the approval and submission of the registration certificate by the regulatory authority, it is necessary to establish reasonable marginal prices, to form a sufficient set and volume of clinical guidelines and to determine in advance the sources of financing and mechanisms of integration into the national system of drug provision.Conclusion. The introduction of drugs for the treatment of rare diseases into circulation leads to a sharp increase in the burden on the budgets of the healthcare system at all levels. Current restrictions and obligations in the field of intellectual property rights protection, the degree of disclosure of medical data in the process of registration and admission to the market require significant changes to the traditional system of drug provision and the system of placing state orders, as well as the introduction of new regulatory mechanisms (for example, compulsory licensing or producing individual dosage forms in pharmacy organizations), contributing to the development of the local pharmaceutical industry and providing the national health system with the necessary volume of drugs with a sufficient level of quality and safety.

Intellectual property protection mechanisms and the characteristics of founding teams

Intellectual property protection mechanisms (IPPMs) are critical to fostering science, technology, and innovation, and their relevance has grown enormously with the increased trade in goods and services involving patentable technologies. Scholars have investigated factors that facilitate or hinder the use of such IP protection strategies by identifying related country, sector, and firm characteristics. However, the extant literature has overlooked the role of the characteristics of a firm’s founding team on the choice of an IPPM strategy. Using data from a large cross-sectional sample of European small, young, and innovative firms, we show that controlling for firm size, R&D intensity, and other firm and market effects, founding team characteristics, such as gender and education, greatly influence the choice of a strategy. In particular, in line with the general finding that women patent less, we find that firms with more women in the founding team patent less than firms with more male founders; but contrary to the literature that has primarily focused on large firms, we find that as the number of female founders increases, small, young entrepreneurial firms tend to use less informal IPPMs rather than formal IPPMs. We also find, within the context of entrepreneurship policy, that the education and not experience of founding team members is a main predictor of IP adoption.

The use of intellectual property protection mechanisms by publicly supported firms

ABSTRACT Technology-based firms use intellectual property protection mechanisms (IPPMs) to appropriate the returns to their research investments. The empirical literature has generally focused on the use of IPPMs by private sector firms to appropriate the returns to their privately financed R&D-based technologies. To date, studies have not considered the use of IPPMs by private sector firms whose research is publicly financed. We identify empirically a number of significant covariates with the use of a portfolio of formal IPPMs consisting of patents, copyrights, and trademarks. However, our multivariate empirical analyses show that caution is needed in generalizing about such covariates when discussing any one particular formal IPPM.

Recent Evolution of Intellectual Property Enforcement in Georgia

AbstractThe article elaborates on the topic of the new wave of evolution of the protection of intellectual property in Georgia inspired by signing the Eu–Georgia Association Agreement, (AA—the Association Agreement between Georgia and the Eu and the nuclear Energy Association of Europe and its Member States). The harmonization process is an impressive field of law on its own. The article deals only with particular issues, such as the role and critical characteristics of the harmonization of intellectual property protection and enforcement mechanisms in Georgia.In this context, the article examines the legal nature of the amendments to the Civil procedure Code of Georgia (GCpC), in particular, a new chapter of enforcement regulations, that has been introduced to the GCPC—‘Specificities in proceedings of the infringement of exclusive right of intellectual property’.The article is predicated upon the allegation that the new legal introductions are merely of a formal character, while the enforcement mechanisms and remedies, as a significant part of Georgian civil legislation, had already been in place and Georgia had ratified major international intellectual property agreements. The article deals with the legal problem of the application of the intellectual property enforcement amendments by the judiciary and measures the practical impact.The hypothesis of the analysis is to consider whether further developments are necessary to contribute to a consistent approach to the adjudication of intellectual property enforcement disputes in Georgian courts and to promote the efficient implementation of the novel intellectual property enforcement mechanisms into the Georgian legal system.The analysis of the characteristics of the impact of harmonization on intellectual property as of intangible rights proves to have wide-ranging benefits for the holders of intellectual property in Georgia or elsewhere in Europe.

Overview of the research and patenting activities that took place in Brazil during the 2010s

A National Innovation System is an interconnected network of public and private institutions that aims at the development and diffusion of new technologies. We use the Derwent Innovations platform to study the patent applications in Brazil between 2010 and 2020, and to identify the main technological areas that have benefited from the research conducted in the country. Our main methodological contribution is to present indicators that measure the technological importance and international scope of Brazilian patents. The results show that private companies rarely resort to intellectual property protection mechanisms and that public universities are responsible for most patent applications. This study concludes that private companies innovate little, and, as a result, academic research tends to act as a substitute for business investments in research and development, especially in software development, pharmaceutical outputs, and scientific instrumentation. On the other hand, Brazilian universities and companies are both being excluded from the global race for the Internet of Things patents that has characterized the fourth industrial revolution.

Coopetition and Product Innovation: The Role of Intellectual Property Protection

We study how firms’ engagement in collaboration with competitors (coopetition) affects their innovation outcomes and investigates the role of protection of intellectual property (IP) within this relationship. As prior research provides mixed results, we consider product innovation in general, and distinguish between new-to-the- firm (incremental) and new-to-the-market (radical) innovation. Moreover, we differentiate between formal IP protection mechanisms (patents, industrial designs, trademarks, copyrights) and informal ones (secrecy, complexity, lead-time). Using an ordinary least squares (OLS) approach, we analyze three samples (one per type of innovation). Each sample consists of around 7,500 German innovating firms from various industries over the years 2001, 2005, 2011 and 2013. The findings reveal that coopetition is beneficial for innovation in general and incremental innovation, while it does not directly affect radical innovation. Moreover, we find that coopetitors aiming at innovation in general or radical innovation benefit from making use of formal IP. Informal mechanisms on the other hand negatively impact those innovation outcomes. Coopetition for incremental innovation does not seem to require any IP protection. This study contributes to extant literature by advancing our understanding of the notion of coopetition and its meaning for firms’ innovation.

TRIPS AGREEMENT AND MALAYSIAN INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY LAWS: DATA EXCLUSIVITY v PATENT

This study analyses the provisions of the Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS) Agreement with respect to the various intellectual property protection mechanisms. The main purpose of this study is to demonstrate that Malaysia is a TRIPS compliance country and have established intellectual property laws including the incorporation of data exclusivity laws. This study also illustrates that data exclusivity and patent are two different intellectual property protection mechanisms required under the TRIPS Agreement. Moreover, this study clarifies the misconception that data exclusivity and patents are somehow related; such that data exclusivity is an extension of patent rights and that it is often regarded as a TRIPS-plus provision. The study is conducted based on qualitative research, predicated on primary sources such as the TRIPS Agreement and the various laws with respect to intellectual property in Malaysia. It is further supported by secondary sources from journals and information provided on relevant authorities’ websites. The results of the study show that Malaysia is a TRIPS compliance country and that data exclusivity is an intellectual property protection mechanism that is established pursuant to Article 39.3 of the TRIPS Agreement. Hence, this study concludes that member countries of the TRIPS Agreement that have established data exclusivity protection mechanism to protect undisclosed data submitted to their respective authorities for the purpose of marketing approval of pharmaceutical or agricultural chemical products, including Malaysia, are indeed in compliance with the obligation set under Article 39.3 of the TRIPS Agreement.

The Bright and the Dark sides of a new Information Reality (in the context of the Intellectual Property protection)

Nowadays changes’ vector related to the information and technological novelties presently shifts: from technical, economic and legal fields - to the socio-cultural dimension. Following the production sectors, other areas of life became the objects of conscious and deliberate innovative activities, that allow us to fix the transition towards an innovative model of social and cultural development, and the corresponding increase in the value of Intellectual Property institutions in today’s post-industrial world. This is why the innovation has become one of the main types of nowadays practical activity with intellectual or creative content, and it’s perceived as an essential precondition for further civilized development.
 The intellectual property may be considered as a specific kind of original information, objectified in appropriate form. The core of any intellectual property object is innovation. The latter may even be understood as its inner substance. And the knowledge should be esteemed as a prelude to innovative or creative process.
 In the article, the main attention was focused on the dialectics of development of our Information reality that is changing gradually, but inevitably. The most controversial point is to keep the balance between the principle of Freedom of information (including free Internet, independent mass-media, privacy on the Web, anonymous sources for press and journalism activity), on the one hand, and the principle of informational safety and public security (i.e. the possibility of state power to resist an external informational aggression, to block disinformation attempts, to prevent manipulations with information that may be really dangerous or harmful to the society in different aspects), on the other hand.
 The general vision of today’s Information space evolution is expressed as an ambiguous process, which implies both the advantages and disadvantages of this new kind of reality. Eventually, this means the existence of the dark side of mentioned processes, and the bright one. It all depends on how people will actually use these technological tools. That’s why the state should always remain the sentinel of this fragile balance between the Freedom of Information in all possible ways, and the Censorship that may be expressed in soft or hard forms.
 The other matter is an Intellectual Property protection mechanism in this new information reality, including international and local legislation, judicial practice, as well as mental, moral and ethical, sociocultural, economic and even geopolitical aspects of IP protection. Everyone should respect the related Laws, and individual commercial & noncommercial rights of authors or possessors. But, simultaneously, this realm of social-economic and legal relations - called "intellectual property" - should be reconsidered deeply, as technological and sociocultural conditions have changed substantially. That’s why we consider the current global IP protection system as the olden one. It must be modernized, and this modernization should be definitely commenced by its liberalization.

Geographical Indications within the Purview of the WTO as a Tool for the Promotion of Economic Interests and Cultural Heritage: Conflicting Positions between the Old World and the New World and Some Solutions Thereof

When it comes to intellectual property under the auspices of the WTO, the divide has always been between the developed countries on the one hand and the developing/least developed countries on the other. Developed countries who enjoy higher levels of innovative and have bigger economies have always pushed for an enhanced and more comprehensive intellectual property protection mechanisms. On the other hand, developing and least developed countries have always pushed back at these attempts. They regard the positions of the developed countries as efforts to force western-style legislation on them. But this has not been the case with Geographical Indications. The alliances and interests are not drawn on developed and developing/’least developed countries lines. They are rather drawn on the lines of the Old World on the one hand, and the New World on the other hand. The Old World is principally composed of European countries while the new world is predominantly composed of the countries born out of colonialism such as the United States, Canada, Australia, Argentina, Chile, South Africa, etc. interestingly, there is a third block which is mainly composed of major Asian ecnomies like China, Hong Kong, Taiwan, etc. Each faction has contradictory positions on what amounts to the appropriate levels of protection of GIs especially on foodstuffs and agricultural products. The Old World wants an enhanced protection on foodstuffs and agricultural products to the levels enjoyed by wines under the TRIPS Agreement. On the other hand, the New World regards the current levels of protection as enough, rigorously pushing back at all attempts at enhanced protection under WTO multilateral negotiations. The third block takes a somewhat compromising position between the two. These disagreements are partially responsible for the failure of the Doha Round of negotiations in the WTO. This paper explores the positions of the various alliances and the arguments that motivate their positions (economic interests and cultural heritage). It employs the case study of the Comprehensive Economic and Trade Agreement (CETA) between the EU and Canada to show how these differences in positions have been successfully laced together by these two trade giants who both represent the two opposing factions. It concludes that with the right amount of will power, this can (though not easily) be replicated in the WTO ongoing multilateral negotiations.

R&D in Duopoly with Intellectual Property Protection Mechanism

We examine the situation in which firms attempt to fully appropriate returns to their own R&D investment through the intellectual property protection mechanism. To do this, we set up three different games: asymmetric IPP, symmetric IPP, and non-IPP regimes. Each game consists of two stages: each firm first undertakes a cost-reducing R&D investment non-cooperatively, and then engages in Cournot competition. We show that the R&D spillover encourages the R&D and the production of the firm with the intellectual property protection but discourages those of other firm without it. We confirm that the rival’s R&D investment without IPP backfires itself due to the boomerang effect of the R&D investment as Choi(2002) mentioned. The social welfare decreases (increases) with R&D spillover when the cost of the intellectual property protection is relatively large (sufficiently low). In addition, if more firms engage in the use of the mechanism, the social welfare becomes lower. In this sense, our finding argues against the public support of generating a large volume of domestic IP.

Pravni i ekonomski aspekti intelektualne svojine u cyber prostoru

The use of information communication technologies as well as massive use of digital tools has influenced the daily activities of people. One of the most obvious indicators of rapid technological development is certainly the amount of information available in digital form. As a result of the use of digital tools and the Internet, a cyber space was created, which is the largest source of information. A variety of digital content is available to users of cyber space. In addition to content that is publicly available and can be used without any restrictions at the same time, a large percentage of digital information is protected by intellectual property rights and copyright and related rights. Beside aforementioned mechanisms for the protection of digital content, there is an evident increase in the number of copyright abuses. Abuse of copyright works causes huge economic damage to the authors of works as well as organizations. The aim of this paper is to analyze the current state of implementation of intellectual property protection mechanisms in the cyber space with a special emphasis on the application of these mechanisms in the Republic of Serbia. Mechanisms for the protection of intellectual property are examined through the domain of application of information communication technologies, legal aspects and registered abuses. At the same time, registered abuses were analyzed from the economic point of view both from the angle of the author of the work and from the perspective of the person who misused the subject work.

The Influence of Education and Scientific Research System on China's Science and Technology Innovation Capability

This article outlines their impact on China's technological innovation capabilities from nine aspects including primary and secondary education to university education, the shortcomings of scientific research evaluation system, the forward-looking of educational investment and the rationality of research funding, the negative feedback of the employment market on innovative research, intellectual property protection and incentive mechanism, The basic social system and its incentive mechanism combined with learning and research, the incentive mechanism and cultural atmosphere of enterprises and administrative institutions, and the origin of China's modern education model. The comprehensive analysis shows that changing the status quo of China's lack of innovation is a systematic project. A single ministry cannot complete many specific measures of reform, and must have a national-level top-level design. Through reform, the education and scientific research system has reasonable design and strong self-repairing ability. It is the need of innovation to promote industrial upgrading. Its effectiveness directly determines whether China can cross the middle income trap and the great rejuvenation of the Chinese nation.

Intellectual Property and Knowledge Leakage: Two Sides of the Same Construct?

Multinational corporations’ (MNCs’) very existence is closely related to taking advantage of differences in knowledge and expertise around the world in terms of both exploiting existing repositories of knowledge and combining them to create new knowledge (Kogut & Zander, 1993). While co-creating, sharing, and combining knowledge, MNCs may find that their knowledge leaks outside their firm boundaries. Alerting managers to the risk of knowledge leakage, IB literature has many examples of MNCs’ alliance partners appropriating their valuable knowledge (Inkpen, 2000). Terms such as “reluctant loser” have been coined to describe the firm that loses out to its alliance partner’s aggressive efforts to acquire its knowledge (Khanna, Gulati, & Nohria, 1998). In the case of international joint ventures, Hertzfeld, Link and Vonortas’s (2006) study of the effectiveness of intellectual property protection mechanisms used by U.S.-based companies in the formation of research partnerships concludes that “IP protection is a fundamental consideration for all research partnership members” (p. 836). MNCs may find themselves competing with domestic firms that are able to upgrade their skills, often by hiring MNC employees and copying marketing and distribution strategies. R&D, in particular, is one of the least internationalized MNC activities because firms fear that doing so will result in a loss of control over the innovation process and knowledge leakage to competitors (Berry, 2014). In sum, knowledge leakage as an undesirable outcome for MNCs with clear distinction between good guys (holders) and bad guys (violators) is an accepted view in IB literature. This panel calls for the need to nuance this statement. Mike Peng, Shawn M Carraher, and David Ahlstrom argue that IPR concerns may be viewed as a more macro oriented special case of micro-oriented knowledge leakage. Zooming on the debate over IPR between the United States and China, they will also argue that a key to predicting the future of the IPR debate lies in a deeper understanding of the past, which can clear up misconceptions.