Date: Monday, April 5, 2026
Organizers: Fide Foundation and Transatlantic Intellectual Property Academy
Executive Summary
The 42nd Global Digital Encounter focused on the role of patents as instruments that both structure and enable international cooperation in innovation-driven economies. Moderated by Professor Laurent Manderieux, the discussion brought together academic and institutional perspectives to examine how a fundamentally territorial patent system operates in a global context. Drawing exclusively on the contributions of the panelists, the session explored patents as mechanisms for managing knowledge as a global public good, facilitating cross-border collaboration, and organizing competition and cooperation among firms, sectors, and regions.
Objectives
- Examine how patents contribute to international cooperation while remaining territorially grounded.
- Discuss how patent statistics and innovation data reflect global technological and economic trends.
- Explore how regional, national, and international patent mechanisms support or hinder cross-border innovation.
- Identify structural limits of international cooperation in patent systems and possible paths forward.
Panelists
- Rochelle Dreyfuss, Engelberg Center on Innovation Law & Policy, NYU School of Law
- Craig Nard, Director, Spangenberg Center for Law, Technology & the Arts, Case Western Reserve University
- Yann Ménière, Chief Economist, European Patent Office (EPO)
- Laurent Manderieux, Professor of IP Law, Bocconi University (Moderator)
Key Discussions & Insights
1. Patents, Knowledge, and the Global Public Good
Yann Ménière framed patents as tools designed to manage a core paradox: inventions consist of non‑rival information that generates broad social value, yet private incentives to invest in innovation remain insufficient without some form of exclusivity. He explained that patents function as a temporary compromise, granting exclusion in exchange for disclosure, thereby enabling global diffusion of knowledge once protection expires. He emphasized that this logic already forces patent systems to operate against a worldwide stock of prior art, embedding internationality at the core of examination practices.
2. International Harmonization and Institutional Cooperation
Rochelle Dreyfuss highlighted that the TRIPS Agreement provides a baseline obligation for WTO members to maintain patent systems, while allowing significant national discretion in implementation. She described ongoing “bottom‑up” harmonization efforts, including regional systems like the EPO, the Patent Cooperation Treaty, the Patent Prosecution Highway, and cooperation among major offices through initiatives such as IP5. These mechanisms aim to reduce duplication of examination work and ease multi‑jurisdictional patenting without eliminating national legal differences.
Yann Ménière complemented this view with the European perspective, explaining that much practical harmonization occurs through shared classification systems, prior‑art databases, and reuse of examination work. According to him, collaboration among patent offices primarily improves efficiency and examination quality rather than altering substantive law.
3. Alternatives and Complements to Patents
Craig Nard discussed non‑patent innovation incentives, including government research grants, R&D tax credits, and innovation prizes. He stressed that none of these mechanisms can fully replace patents and that innovation systems operate best through combinations. Patents, in his view, remain distinctive because they decentralize decision‑making: firms and individuals choose where to invest, while markets, rather than bureaucracies, determine outcomes.
Yann Ménière added that these alternative mechanisms require centralized information processing and are therefore best suited to narrowly defined objectives, whereas patents allow distributed risk‑taking and experimentation.
4. Sectoral Differences and the Role of Trade Secrecy
The panel agreed that patents function differently across sectors. Craig Nard argued that life sciences and pharmaceuticals tend to show clearer social benefits from patenting due to high development costs and ease of imitation, while in software and electronics first‑mover advantages and trade secrets often play a larger role.
Rochelle Dreyfuss focused on artificial intelligence, noting that many AI advances—such as algorithms and training data—are difficult or impossible to patent and are instead protected through secrecy. She observed that while trade secrets can facilitate collaboration, they limit disclosure and cumulative learning. Yann Ménière described this balance as an “iceberg” model, where patents represent the visible portion of a much larger base of confidential know‑how.
5. Innovation, Cooperation, and Competition
Yann Ménière used empirical observations from EPO data to show that innovation has become increasingly global, with strong growth in Asia, particularly in China and South Korea. He emphasized that co‑patenting and cross‑border collaboration are common features of modern innovation systems. He illustrated this with an example of a small European company using a global patent portfolio to license technology to large multinational firms, combining competition with cooperation.
Rochelle Dreyfuss reinforced this point by noting the shift away from vertically integrated “not‑invented‑here” models toward distributed innovation networks supported by licensing and shared IP frameworks.
6. One‑Size‑Fits‑All and Development Considerations
In the concluding discussion, the panel addressed whether a single patent model can serve diverse economies. Rochelle Dreyfuss argued that while patent systems may appear uniform, flexibilities within international frameworks allow countries to adapt them to different stages of development, citing the use of utility models in East Asian economies. Craig Nard cautioned against imposing substantively stronger patent standards uniformly, noting potential risks for developing countries’ policy autonomy. Yann Ménière concluded that the patent system has historically adapted across industrial revolutions and must now evolve again in response to digitalization, globalization, and acceleration of innovation.
Conclusions
- Patents operate internationally by necessity, even though legal rights remain territorial.
- Institutional cooperation among patent offices is central to managing global prior art and reducing duplication.
- Patents work alongside other innovation incentives, each with distinct strengths and limits.
- Sectoral diversity, especially the rise of digital technologies and AI, challenges traditional patent logic and increases reliance on trade secrets.
- Flexibility, rather than uniformity, is essential for patent systems to remain relevant across regions and stages of economic development.
This encounter is part of the Global Digital Encounters. An innitiative by the Fide Foundation and Transatlantic Intellectual Property Academy. Our two institutions have joined forces to organize a serial of digital encounters to try and find out if Intellectual Property is equipped to face the ongoing changes that our world is experiencing.
All online encounters are opened to any interested person and speakers have been selected among the most relevant IP scholars and professionals all over the world.
The situation we live in has highlighted and made unstoppable something that we already knew: we are heading towards a world in which intangible assets are going to be key in a society oriented towards artificial intelligence and the data economy, where Industry 4.0,
Biotechnology and Biocomputing will be the keywords for the future.
So, the question is served: if intangible assets are increasingly important, how is the Intellectual Property system duly equipped to respond to the needs of this new world?
Let us address this fundamental issue with courage !!!
The Global Digital Encounters form integral part of the solidarity projects run by both organizations to support the international, European and national plans to overcome the sanitary and financial consequences of the COVID-19
