ANTITRUST AND INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY

R. Hewitt Pate, Acting Assistant Attorney General, Antitrust Division, U.S. Department of Justice

3/11/2015
(Original Publish Date: 2003)

Many observers, particularly in the antitrust community, contend there is a tension between antitrust and intellectual property, arguing that the antitrust laws seek to eliminate monopolies and encourage competition, while the intellectual property laws reward creators and inventors with a limited monopoly. Some suggest that there is a need for an expansion of antitrust that would place severe limits on the enjoyment of intellectual property rights. They say that courts afford undue weight to intellectual property protections in the balancing of the two regimes.