Well, patents are certainly a good way to create monopolies, which wouldn't exist in an actually free market with no patents. In addition, there's interventions

Well, patents are certainly a good way to create monopolies, which wouldn't exist in an actually free market with no patents. In addition, there's interventions in place which don't allow certain tech exports to China, for example. Not sure how much better the situation would be without these. I think the principle is called perfect market or perfect competition, but it's only a theoretical concept. However, it's certainly possible that the market is less perfect than it could be due to interventions and regulations.