<p> This Dissertation investigates the relationship between patent quality and company performance for a sample from the US Biotechnology and Pharmaceutical Industry. The methodology devised comprehensively examines patent worth (patent&rsquo;s references), patent protection (claims and family patents) and patent quality (references, claims and family patents) to determine their implications on firm leverage (SE, TA), profits (ROE, ROA), and market value (B/M, MCap). The selected sample comprises 1,536 companies, and 285,000 patents from 1999 to 2009. The results show that total revenue just responds to changes in R&D; intensity, and patenting intensity. A 10 percent increase in patent value results in a corresponding increase rate on the market capitalization index for the full sample and a 14 percent increase for the chemicals and allied products group (SIC 28). Increases (10%) in patent protection and quality present average increases of 15 percent on market capitalization for the full sample and 8 percent for the chemicals and allied products group (SIC 28). The medical devices group (SIC 38) results suggest that Mcap increases 10 percent by the same increase in patent value index. Patent protection and quality increases (10%) suggest an average 8 percent increase in Mcap. Results suggest that profits, leverage and market indices respond differently to 10 percent increases in patent value, patent protections and patent quality. The aforementioned effects suggest that the qualitative indexes follow company related market activities and business valuations for the chemical and allied products, and medical devices industrial sectors.</p>

Dans la mesure où la marque facilite le choix des consommateurs dans le spectre des variétés et qualités des produits, elle s'avère indispensable pour l'allocation efficace des ressources dans le processus productif, devenant ainsi un actif important des entreprises, au point qu'il existe désormais un « marché » sur lequel se rencontrent une offre et une demande de marques. En ce sens, le travail de recherche s'articule sur l'analyse économique de l'offre par les entreprises et les contrefacteurs et la demande de marques par les consommateurs. D'abord, il s'agit de démontrer que l'offre de marque est assimilable à un moyen de différenciation de l'entreprise sur un marché concurrentiel. La marque apparaît comme un vecteur important de l'activité entrepreneuriale, source de croissance. Ensuite, une autre partie de la recherche est consacrée à l'analyse de la marque du côté de la demande, et notamment à un aspect particulier de la demande de marque qui réside dans la demande de contrefaçon de marques. Nous proposons un modèle théorique d'achat de contrefaçons de marque avec un mécanisme de théorie des jeux sur la formation d'une norme sociale. Enfin, la présente étude tente de démontrer que les comportements de consommation de contrefaçon restent largement influencés par le cadre légal qui régit la contrefaçon de marque, et que l'efficacité des politiques de lutte contre ce phénomène est affectée par un élargissement du marché de la contrefaçon, lequel résulte de l'expansion croissante des nouvelles technologies et du développement de la consommation en réseau. / To the extent that brandname facilitates consumer choice in the spectrum of varieties and qualities of products, it is a determining factor of the efficient allocation of resources in the production process, thus becoming an important corporate asset, up to the point that there is now a "market" of brands where meet supply and demand for brands. Thus, this research is based on an economic analysis of the supply of brands by firms and counterfeiters and the demand for brands by consumers. First, it is to show that supplying a brand is comparable to a means of differentiating the firm in a competitive market, and the mark appears as an important driver of entrepreneurial activity and a source growth. Then, another part of the research is devoted to the analysis of the mark on the demand side of the market, including a particular aspect of the demand for trademark which is the demand for trademark infringement. We build a theoretical model of purchasing counterfeited brands with a mechanism of game theory on the formation of a social norm. Finally, we attempt to show that counterfeit consumption behavior remains largely influenced by the legal framework governing trademark infringement, and that the effectiveness of policies to fight against this phenomenon is affected by an expansion of the market counterfeiting, which results from the increasing expansion of new technologies and the growth of consumption in the network.