Licensing agreements: strategies for using intellectual property rights

Abstract

The rapid evolution of the digital economy has significantly increased the potential for the development of products related to intellectual property rights, and has also provided favorable conditions for their further use based on license agreements.

The purpose of the article is to develop recommendations for the use of license agreements to effectively commercialize intellectual property rights in the context of Ukraine's digital economy.

A license agreement is a universal tool that enables innovative enterprises to maintain control over intellectual property rights, maximize income, and minimize risk.

The article establishes the dualistic nature of a license agreement as an independent contractual type at the intersection of the General and Special parts of civil law, with special imperative norms taking priority. A significant differentiation of the regulation of license agreements depending on the type of intellectual property rights object is revealed. Types of licenses are classified into exclusive, single, non-exclusive, open, sublicense, cross-license, patent pools, and SaaS/on-premise, with justification of selection criteria based on intellectual property rights object, product life cycle stage, market size, and business goals. A hybrid phased licensing strategy, risk-minimization mechanisms, and a matrix algorithm for selecting the optimal commercialization model are developed.

The proposed recommendations will ensure systematic management of intellectual property rights, thereby increasing the investment attractiveness and competitiveness of Ukrainian developments on the global market. A promising direction for further research is the adaptation of licensing strategies to generative artificial intelligence and Big Data, and the implementation of EU Directive 2019/790 into national legislation, taking into account empirical data on the effectiveness of various models in the post-war economic recovery.