专利诉讼影响企业专利申请质量的作用机理研究

The inconsistency between the rapid growth of patent litigation and the low compensation for patent infringement has had a great impact on the production and operation, technology innovation and patent applications of enterprises.Strengthening the intellectual property protection intensity has become the consensus of the public.The existing literatures mainly focus on the characteristics of litigation patents and enterprises involved in the litigation, and the impact of patent litigation experience on the R&D investment and the number of patent applications of enterprises. There is not much empirical literatures on the influence mechanism of patent litigation on the patent application quality of enterprises.This project intends to select the plaintiff enterprise that has experienced the invention patent litigation for the first time in China as the research object, and measures the quality of patent application by designing three different indicators——the average numbers of patent claims, the numbers of technical features of independent claims, and the breadth of patent knowledge. On the one hand, we intend to discuss the heterogeneity of the patent litigation experience affecting the patent application quality of enterprises with the method of Tobit model; on the other hand, we will study the mechanism of patent litigation efficiency affecting the quality of patent applications by making uses of Difference in Differences model. Finally, some suggestions will be given for the optimization of intellectual property strategies of enterprises and the strengthening of patent judicial protection.

专利诉讼快速增长与专利侵权赔偿低之间的不协调对企业生产经营、技术研发和专利申请产生了较大影响，强化知识产权保护已成为社会大众的共识。现有文献主要集中在诉讼专利属性特征、涉诉主体特征以及专利诉讼经历对企业研发投入、专利申请数量的影响等方面，关于专利诉讼影响企业专利申请质量的实证文献还不多。本项目拟选取在我国境内第一次经历发明专利诉讼的原告企业作为研究对象，通过设计平均权利要求数量、独立权利要求技术特征数、专利知识宽度三个指标反映专利申请质量，借助Tobit模型探讨专利诉讼经历影响企业专利申请质量的规模异质性和产业异质性，利用双重差分模型研究专利诉讼效率提升影响企业专利申请质量的作用机理，以期为企业优化知识产权战略提供支撑，为完善专利法强化专利司法保护提供对策建议。

加强知识产权保护是促进企业创新和经济发展的重要激励。现有文献主要关注诉讼经历对企业专利申请数量和研发投入的影响，专利诉讼对企业专利申请质量影响机理研究还比较薄弱。因此，本项目以首次提起国内发明专利诉讼的原告企业和国内首次经历涉外发明专利的被告企业为研究对象，设计平均权利要求数量、独立权利要求数量、第一独立权利要求字数三个指标反映专利申请质量，收集整理2000-2020年我国发明专利诉讼判决数据，借助面板Tobit模型探讨专利诉讼经历和专利诉讼期限影响企业专利申请质量的规模异质性，利用双重差分模型研究知识产权法院判决对企业专利申请质量的影响效应，研究发现：（1）庭审经历有利于原告企业和被告企业深入认识专利侵权判定原则，激励企业提升专利申请质量，诉讼判决结果对企业专利申请质量影响不显著。（2）经历发明专利诉讼后，原告企业既追求更宽的专利保护范围，也注重专利权法律稳定性的提升。（3）相比小微企业，涉外发明专利诉讼对大中型被告企业专利申请质量的改进效果更明显；小微企业涉诉后专利申请数量呈现倒U型增长关系，创新基础薄弱的小微企业涉诉后专利申请更活跃，但受限于经济效率影响，从诉讼后第五年开始，企业专利申请质量不再正向增长。（4）专利诉讼期限与原告企业的专利申请质量负相关，而且诉讼期限越长，负向效应越明显。（5）相比普通法院，知识产权法院判决对原告企业专利申请质量的激励效应并没有比较优势。尽管知识产权法院判决的损害赔偿更高，然而，控制其他因素的影响后，知识产权法院判决并没有表现出“亲专利”倾向，而且，知识产权法院在诉讼期限、上诉率方面也没有表现出明显的优势。项目研究成果对优化企业知识产权战略和强化我国专利司法具有重要的理论价值和实践意义。