Regulating Industrial Internet Through IPR, Data Protection and Competition Law

The digitization of industrial processes has suddenly taken a great leap forward, with burgeoning applications in manufacturing, transportation and numerous other areas. Many stakeholders, however, are uncertain about the opportunities and risks associated with it and what it really means for businesses and national economies. Clarity of legal rules is now a pressing necessity. This book, the first to deal with legal questions related to Industrial Internet, follows a multidisciplinary approach that is instructed by law concerning intellectual property, data protection, competition, contracts and licensing, focusing on business, technology and policy-driven issues. Experts in various relevant fields of science and industry measure the legal tensions created by Industrial Internet in our global economy and propose solutions that are both theoretically valuable and concretely practical, identifying workable business models and practices based on both technical and legal knowledge. Perspectives include the following: regulating Industrial Internet via intellectual property rights (IPR); data ownership versus control over data; artificial intelligence and IPR infringement; patent owning in Industrial Internet; abuse of dominance in Industrial Internet platforms; data collaboration, pooling and hoarding; legal implications of granular versioning technologies; and misuse of information for anticompetitive purposes. The book represents a record of a major collaborative project, held between 2016 and 2019 in Finland, involving a number of universities, technology firms and law firms. As Industrial Internet technologies are already being used in several businesses, it is of paramount importance for the global economy that legal, business and policy-related challenges are promptly analyzed and discussed. This crucially important book not only reveals the legal and policy-related issues that we soon will have to deal with but also facilitates the creation of legislation and policies that promote Industrial-Internet-related technologies and new business opportunities. It will be warmly welcomed by practitioners, patent and other IPR attorneys, innovation economists and companies operating in the Industrial Internet ecosystem, as well as by competition authorities and other policymakers.

Rosa Maria Ballardini is an Associate Professor at the University of Lapland. Since 2005 she has researched and thaught in the field of IP law at various universities. Rosa s research interests focus on the interface between IP law and technology, including social innovation models, topics where she has published extensively. Petri Kuoppamäki is Professor of Business law at Aalto University. His field of specialization is competition law, public procurement law and EU law. Professor Kuoppamäki is a member of the Academy of Finland, Culture and Society Board and lifetime member of the Finnish Academy of Science and Letters. Olli Pitkänen is a founder and the CLO of 1001 Lakes Oy. Previously, he worked as the Research Director at IPR University Center and as a senior research scientist at Aalto University. . He is a member of Copyright Council and a part-time judge at the Market Court.