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Intellectual property rights are valuable assets for firms. A patent grants its owner the right to prevent others from using a particular invention. As such, it allows the owner to create a (temporary) monopoly and to earn the associated monopoly rents. A patent owner may also decide to license its invention to another firm. Firms who do this strive to create a strong ‘patent portfolio’which gives them significant power in a particular market or even industry. The rationale behind this is that this compensates the R&D investments of inventors, thereby stimulating innovation.

Having a strong patent portfolio allows a firm to enter into cross-licensing agreements and socalled ‘patent pools’, in which many firms pledge a portion of their patents for the sake of creating a standard. In this case, patents are the ‘bartering chips’. Patents can also be used as a collateral to secure loans and investments. Over time, firms have also discovered ways to exploit the patent system, and use their patent portfolio to actively block competitors. Some even go as far as to apply for patents specifically for this reason (‘strategic patenting’).