Patents, Antitrust, and Innovation: Evidence from the Xerox Case
[Published Version] [Working Paper]
Journal of Industrial Economics, 2026, 74(2), 278-294.
Non-technical summary: ProMarket
Winner of the CRESSE-CCIA Young Researcher Award for the Best Paper on the Digital Economy, 2025
Finalist at the Young Talent Competition Award at the Lear Competition Festival, 2023
Abstract: How does antitrust enforcement affect innovation when patents are the main barrier to entry? I address this question by empirically studying the US antitrust case against Xerox, the former monopolist in the market for plain-paper copiers. In 1975, Xerox accepted a consent decree whose primary remedy was compulsory licensing of all its copier-technology patents in the US and abroad. I show that this antitrust intervention promoted innovation by other firms in the copier industry, measured by a disproportionate increase in patenting in technology classes with a higher propensity for containing copier-related inventions. This effect is driven by Japanese competitors, whose patenting became more novel and diverse as they started developing smaller desktop copiers.
Imperfect Price Information, Market Power, and Tax Pass-Through
(with Felix Montag, Alina Sagimuldina, and Monika Schnitzer)
[Latest Version] [Stigler Center Working Paper] [CRC Discussion Paper]
Non-technical summary: ProMarket
Abstract: Imperfect consumer price information gives sellers market power. We study how this shapes tax pass-through. In a consumer search model, pass-through rises with the share of consumers who know all prices and is higher for the lowest price in a market, paid by informed consumers, than for the average price, paid by uninformed consumers. Pass-through to the average price is nonmonotonic in the number of sellers, whereas the pass-through gap between the two prices widens with it. Five tax changes in German and French fuel markets support these predictions, comparing fuel types with differently informed buyers within the same stations.