'Daniel Cahoy and Lynda Oswald have brought together some of the country's most prominent patent scholars outside the legal discipline. From the LeahySmith America Invents Act to recent court cases from the Supreme Court and the Federal Circuit, this timely, informative and well-edited volume examines the latest changes in US patent law and their impact on business strategy. The book is a must-read for anybody who wants to learn more deeply about the ever-increasing role of patents in the business environment.' Peter K. Yu, Drake University Law School, US Within the complex global economy, patents function as indispensable tools for fostering and protecting innovation. This fascinating volume offers a comprehensive perspective on the US patent system, detailing its many uses and outlining several critical legislative, administrative and judicial reforms that impact business strategy. The expert contributors to this book provide an overview of how the US patent system functions today and describe how recent changes affect firms and individual inventors. Topics discussed include the drivers of intellectual property policy; recent revisions to the patent application process in terms of the new first-to-file regime, inequitable conduct, and allowable subject matter; and changes to patent enforcement and infringement related to the Federal Circuit's special role and post-grant review. Contributors address recent legislation such as the 2011 America Invents Act, which enacted some of the most significant patent reforms in decades. This examination of the US patent system highlights some of the most important issues for business. It will serve as an important tool for both policymakers and business leaders, and will also interest students and professors of business and management studies, innovation studies and business law.

Multinational economic actors, particularly corporations, play a defining role in the response to the climate change or warming debate and the emerging scientific consensus. This book describes, explains, and predicts how multinational firms will rise to the multiple challenges posed by global climate issues and the organizational and behavioral various responses of the international corporate community. It focuses on three core research and learning objectives. Firstly, it develops the core idea that multinational enterprises cannot implement meaningful sustainability initiatives without an appropriate governance system and corporate culture. Building on this notion, it addresses the question of environmental sustainability across select industry sectors, such oil and banking. Finally, drawing on a diverse range of contributing experts, it presents select best practices such as the opportunities arising from smart technologies implementation to achieve symbiotic industrial relationships, directed particularly towards the ecological environment of these firms’ transborder operations and global reach.

Analysing the role of multinational investors in emerging Asian economies and the implications for regional economic integration, this astute study examines the increasing role being played by Asian countries in the global economy. Encompassing a large number of diverse manufacturing and service sectors, this book highlights the cultural and strategic challenges faced by multinational investors in the region in which they invest. It shows that despite high rates of economic growth in Asian countries presenting multinational traders and investors with unparalleled market opportunities, there have been only tentative moves towards regional economic integration. Areas such as trade facilitation, uniform customs clearance, removal of non-tariff barriers and labour deployment issues are yet to be adequately addressed.

The explosion in intellectual capital coincides with a growing understanding of the importance of human capital to the firm. This book examines the pressing legal issues that arise at the intersections of intellectual property law, employment law, and

America is at the frontier of modern technological and scientific advances and sustaining economic growth depends substantially on its ability to advance that frontier. This insightful book provides some important ideas to enhance this process. The con

Drawing on original research, Multinationals, Local Capacity Building and Development presents an extensive analysis of MNEs in Africa, taking Ghana as a case study, and broaching subject matter previously unaddressed in the field. Looking at MNEs impacts – both positive and negative – this book examines skill transfer from foreign management to local workers, the impact of MNEs on the improvement of local production capabilities, as well as their contributions to sustainable development goals.

An original and insightful book, this work focuses on domestic and overseas firms operating in those Central Asian and Eastern European countries considered to be the transitional economic periphery. Chapters shed light on their distinct forms of capitalism, and how it influences and adapts the firms located there. The eminent authors show how, in a post-state socialist world, there are several implications for both domestic and overseas firms functioning successfully in the transitional periphery. With the complex mix of political and market mediation and informal personal ties, chapters explore the delicate balance of liberalisation in transitional economies. Detailed examples from specific countries in Eurasia and Central Asia such as Belarus, Turkey, Azerbaijan, Mongolia, Uzbekistan, Armenia and Georgia are discussed alongside broader thematic issues of economic and social change, labour relations and human resource management. Most importantly, it is shown that liberalisation has little connection to short-term business growth. To succeed in such contexts, international firms need to be both pragmatic and creative, in coping with malleable yet durable forms of institutional mediation. Providing a unique perspective on the transitional economic periphery and much-needed insights from international business, this book is essential reading for researchers and graduate students studying transitional economies, non-traditional business models, institutional persistence and change, political and economic development and management in economically transitioning countries.

The Development of International Businessoffers an extensive understanding of contemporary international business through detailed, engaging discussion of the development of the multinational enterprise (MNE) over the past half-century. By providing an analytically informed basis for understanding MNEs, two parallel strands of analysis in International Business (IB) are reviewed: the `theoretical' and the `practical'. Firstly, Robert Pearce identifies how the practical restructuring of the MNE as an organisational form has responded to changes in the wider global economy and how this evolution has interacted with the enrichment of theory on the topic. Secondly, by tracing the persisting dynamics of the MNE's structure and strategic positioning, he demonstrates the use of these systems and how they can help to understand and organise the future evolution of not only MNEs but of international business as a whole. Highly accessible with an informed overview of the entire IB subject area, The Development of International Business is an essential text for students and academics of business, management, economics and development. More generally, business leaders, economists and politicians will value the exceptional insight into the progression of international business and its future.

This key new book synthesises Peter Buckley's work on ‘the global factory’ – the modern networked multinational enterprise. The role of interfirm networks, entrepreneurship and cooperation in the creation and management of global factories leads to a discussion of their governance, internal knowledge transfer strategies and performance, including their role in potentially combating societal failures. Emerging country multinationals are examined as a special case of global factories with a focus on Indian and Chinese multinationals, their involvement in tax havens and offshore financial centres, the performance and processes of their acquisition strategies – all seen as key aspects of globalisation.

This book is an essential resource for academics and students of strategic management, international business and business studies. It also has significant value for practitioners and policy-makers in that it will highlight important factors in a firm�