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Oswald, Lynda J.; Pagnattaro, Marisa Anne --- "Introduction" [2015] ELECD 765; in Oswald, J. Lynda; Pagnattaro, Anne Marisa (eds), "Managing the Legal Nexus Between Intellectual Property and Employees" (Edward Elgar Publishing, 2015) 1

Book Title: Managing the Legal Nexus Between Intellectual Property and Employees

Editor(s): Oswald, J. Lynda; Pagnattaro, Anne Marisa

Publisher: Edward Elgar Publishing

ISBN (hard cover): 9781783479252

Section Title: Introduction

Author(s): Oswald, Lynda J.; Pagnattaro, Marisa Anne

Number of pages: 12

Extract:

Introduction
Lynda J. Oswald and Marisa Anne Pagnattaro

Surprisingly little research has been directed specifically at the impact of
the new business environment on employee-employer relationships,
domestically and globally. As the Industrial Age has been supplanted by
the Information Age, we have seen a historic rise in inventive and
creative activity.1 The last half century has also seen a shift in firm
behavior, from a highly structured model of vertical integration2 to a
networked form of organization that relies heavily on the use of supplier
firms, outsourced or shared collaboration models of research and devel-
opment, and internationally distributed workforces.3 The implications of
these shifts in business focus on both firm activity and employment
patterns and behavior are profound. Patents, copyrights, trade secrets, and
trademarks ­ the traditional four pillars of intellectual property law ­
have taken on increased import and firms must now concentrate on the
protection of those assets in a more intense manner than they ever
experienced in the past.

1
PATENTING AND INNOVATION IN METROPOLITAN AMERICA, BROOKINGS INSTI-
TUTION (Feb. 1, 2013), http://www.brookings.edu/research/interactives/2013/
metro patenting. A collaboration between Cornell University, INSEAD, and the
World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) has resulted in an index that
attempts to measure global innovation. See SOUMITRA DUTTA, BRUNO LANVIN &
SACHA WUNSCH-VINCENT, THE GLOBAL INNOVATION INDEX 2014: THE HUMAN
FACTOR IN INNOVATION (2014), available at http://www.wipo.int/edocs/pubdocs/
en/economics/gii/gii_2014.pdf.
2
NEIL FLIGSTEIN, THE TRANSFORMATION OF CORPORATE CONTROL ( ...