| This thesis analyzes recent developments in the application of the antitrust principles to unilateral conduct involving intellectual property rights in the EU and in the US. The scope of antitrust intervention in the realm of intellectual property illustrates how antitrust enforcers in these two jurisdictions perceive the role of antitrust law and its scope. Whereas the scope of antitrust laws has been shrinking in the US, EU competition law has been consistently used to regulate a number of issues that are considered to be outside the scope of the Sherman Act. This has had significant consequences for the application of antitrust rules to intellectual property rights in the two jurisdictions. US antitrust authorities have been reluctant to intervene in what is perceived to be the sphere of intellectual property policy and take the view that any competitive concerns are better remedied by changes to intellectual property laws. In contrast, the EU antitrust enforcers have been much more active than their US counterparts in addressing the consequences of what they perceive as imperfect intellectual property laws and, consequently, in the shaping of substantive standards of intellectual property protection. These divergent approaches are troubling in the context of global economy. |
