Jul 9, 2006

PhD scholarship in Industrial Economics - France

PhD scholarship in Industrial Economics

Center of Industrial Economics (Cerna), Ecole Nationale Supérieure des mines de Paris (France)

Cerna recently launched a 5 years research programme on "Patent reforms in Europe" with the sponsorship of international companies. It aims at contributing to a better understanding of the economic aspects of patent reforms in Europe. It will carry out and disseminate academic research to document the debates on intellectual property (e.g., software patent, Community patent).

4 topics will be addressed:

 The political economy of patent reforms. The research will use the tools of Political Economy to study the processes that have led to the failure of several patent reforms in Europe. The research aims at identifying the different categories of stakeholders and their respective costs and benefits in the reform process, and to evaluate whether there is room for new reforms

 The innovative and pro-competitive effects of horizontal licensing. The research will focus on the economic effects of licensing agreements between competitors. Such agreements include principally bilateral cross-licensing agreements and patent pools backing industry standards. They are especially frequent in Information and Communication industries, where they facilitate the circulation of research outcomes
at the industry level. Besides their static impact on market prices, it is of prime importance to understand how they affect the dynamics of innovation.

 The interactions between open source software and proprietary systems. The research will investigate why companies participate in the development of open source software (as a matter of fact, the main contributors to major open source software are now paid by private companies.), how the use of open source software for business purpose can affect competition, and to what extent the legal institutions supporting open source software are compatible with business activities.

 The protection of technologies that protect contents. This topic addresses the problem of Digital Right Management technologies (DRM) in the content industries. Such technologies allow the secure distribution of digital copyrighted content (music, video) to consumers who agree to pay for it. Their emergence may be impeded by competition between technology providers. Our purpose is to study how the protection of DRM technologies by patents does influence the emergence of standards in the industry.

Cerna wants to recruit two PhD students who will join the faculty involved in the research programme. The proposed scholarship is approximately 1400 EUR monthly. PhD scholarship in Industrial Economics

Center of Industrial Economics (Cerna), Ecole Nationale Supérieure des mines de Paris (France)

Cerna recently launched a 5 years research programme on "Patent reforms in Europe" with the sponsorship of international companies. It aims at contributing to a better understanding of the economic aspects of patent reforms in Europe. It will carry out and disseminate academic research to document the debates on intellectual property (e.g., software patent, Community patent).

4 topics will be addressed:

 The political economy of patent reforms. The research will use the tools of Political Economy to study the processes that have led to the failure of several patent reforms in Europe. The research aims at identifying the different categories of stakeholders and their respective costs and benefits in the reform process, and to evaluate whether there is room for new reforms

 The innovative and pro-competitive effects of horizontal licensing. The research will focus on the economic effects of licensing agreements between competitors. Such agreements include principally bilateral cross-licensing agreements and patent pools backing industry standards. They are especially frequent in Information and Communication industries, where they facilitate the circulation of research outcomes
at the industry level. Besides their static impact on market prices, it is of prime importance to understand how they affect the dynamics of innovation.

 The interactions between open source software and proprietary systems. The research will investigate why companies participate in the development of open source software (as a matter of fact, the main contributors to major open source software are now paid by private companies.), how the use of open source software for business purpose can affect competition, and to what extent the legal institutions supporting open source software are compatible with business activities.

 The protection of technologies that protect contents. This topic addresses the problem of Digital Right Management technologies (DRM) in the content industries. Such technologies allow the secure distribution of digital copyrighted content (music, video) to consumers who agree to pay for it. Their emergence may be impeded by competition between technology providers. Our purpose is to study how the protection of DRM technologies by patents does influence the emergence of standards in the industry.

Cerna wants to recruit two PhD students who will join the faculty involved in the research programme. The proposed scholarship is approximately 1400 EUR monthly.

Contact: François Lévêque
leveque@cerna.ensmp.fr

[sursa beasiswa]