Patent protection: Functions and weaknesses

While patent protection has been established for many centuries, its criticism has been growing. The aim of this article is to identify the main functions of the patent protection system as well as its weaknesses. This article shows that main functions of patent protection may be grouped into following categories: protection, information disclosure, trade and finance, defensive functions and an input in the innovation process. On the other hand, main weaknesses of patent protection system are: slowing down the technological progress, hindering the commercial application of innovative ideas, possible hostile take-overs of patent owners, creating barriers to innovation due to complementary patents and patent thickets, patent wars and patent trolls. Despite those downsides, patent protection system seems to be unrivaled