Autonomia privata e principio di esaurimento nel caso dei brevetti biotecnologici

This article deals with the relationship between freedom of contracts and the exhaustion effects of intellectual property protection, with a focus on biotechnological inventions. Recent cases in the United States are worth comparison with the solutions adopted by the European legislator in the biotech directive. The self-replicable nature of biotechnological inventions raises the legal issue of the exhaustion of patent protection and the ability for the patent holder to control the distribution of the patented goods downstream.