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<p>As the world becomes more globalized, multinational firms based in the United States have begun to seek research and development (R&amp;D) from inventors in countries outside of the US. Recently, these firms have also started using R&amp;D workers from emerging economies with relatively weak intellectual property rights (IPR) protection. Offshoring R&amp;D to these areas then exposes firms to the risk of product imitation. To mitigate this risk, US firms have lobbied the US government to negotiate with other countries to strengthen their IPR laws. Using publicly available data from the United States Patent and Trademark Office, this paper collects the number of inventors from emerging and developed countries that each US multinational firm employs each year. The patent dataset is then combined with lobbying data from the Senate’s Office of Public Records. This paper shows that firms that have already lobbied the US government in this regard are more likely to increase their R&amp;D offshoring to the developing world. Lobbying firms also increase the number of inventors used both abroad and in the US. Finally, these firms also spread out their innovation network over multiple countries after lobbying for IPR reform.</p>

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International lobbying for intellectual property rights reform: the effect on R&D offshoring to the developing world

  • 期刊论文

  • 发表日期：

    2026年4月2日

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  • Zachary Cohle

摘要

As the world becomes more globalized, multinational firms based in the United States have begun to seek research and development (R&D) from inventors in countries outside of the US. Recently, these firms have also started using R&D workers from emerging economies with relatively weak intellectual property rights (IPR) protection. Offshoring R&D to these areas then exposes firms to the risk of product imitation. To mitigate this risk, US firms have lobbied the US government to negotiate with other countries to strengthen their IPR laws. Using publicly available data from the United States Patent and Trademark Office, this paper collects the number of inventors from emerging and developed countries that each US multinational firm employs each year. The patent dataset is then combined with lobbying data from the Senate’s Office of Public Records. This paper shows that firms that have already lobbied the US government in this regard are more likely to increase their R&D offshoring to the developing world. Lobbying firms also increase the number of inventors used both abroad and in the US. Finally, these firms also spread out their innovation network over multiple countries after lobbying for IPR reform.