Understanding the technology market for patents: New insights from a licensing survey of Japanese firms

This paper provides an empirical analysis of the technology market for patents in Japan, by using a novel firm-level dataset that combines a Japanese Patent Office survey titled Survey of Intellectual Property Activities, the Institute of Intellectual Property patent database, and the Licensing Activity Survey conducted by the University of Tokyo. In this paper, we use a two-step model to estimate a firm's licensing propensities; the first step estimates the determinants of potential licensors (willingness to license) and the second step identifies the factors of the actual licensing out of technology (licensing propensity). We found that a significant number of patents held by firms are not licensed out, although the owners are willing to do so. Our econometric analysis reveals that a major factor behind this technology market imperfection is the potential licensors’ difficulty in finding licensing partners.     

Intra-plant diffusion of new technology: Role of productivity in the study of steel refining furnaces

This paper examines intra-plant diffusion of new technology in the Japanese steel industry. The introduction of the basic oxygen furnace (BOF) was the greatest breakthrough in steel refining in the last century. Using unique panel data, the paper estimates total factor productivity by technology type, and associates the estimates with intra-plant diffusion. The paper finds that intra-plant diffusion accounts for about a half of the industry productivity growth. Large plants are likely to adopt the new technology earlier, but retain the old technology longer, than their smaller counterparts.     

Joint ventures and technology adoption: A Chinese industrial policy that backfired

To spur technology transfer, emerging market policymakers often require foreign firms to form joint ventures (JVs) with domestic firms. Through knowledge spillovers, JVs may reduce technology acquisition costs for domestic firms. Yet domestic firm rents from JVs could discourage innovation through a cannibalization effect. Which force dominates is an empirical question. I address it with novel data on China's auto sector. In response to fuel economy standards requiring firms to upgrade technology or sacrifice quality, firms with JVs reduced quality and price relative to their counterparts. Consistent with cannibalization, firms with JVs drive the negative effect.     

Market size and innovation: The intermediary role of technology licensing

Previous literature finds that larger downstream markets fuel the innovation of new technologies by incentivizing firms to spend more on R&D. Our evidence shows that larger markets also increase the extent of licensing-based cooperation between upstream innovators and downstream commercializers. This cooperation is valuable because it pools firms’ complementary capabilities. Thus, downstream market expansions could positively impact innovative outcomes even holding R&D expenditures constant. Evidence is drawn from the drug candidate licensing market, exploiting the quasi-experimental variation introduced by the enactment of the Medicare Part D program in 2003. A model for the determination of equilibrium commercialization strategies in Markets for Technology rationalizes our finding. In this framework, cooperation gains are proportional to market size but transaction costs are not. Thus, larger downstream markets foster cooperation by reducing the relative importance of the latter. To better match the empirical context, the model extends the canonical “one technology–one application” framework of related work, to the more general case of “composite technologies,” which may have more than one end-user application.     

Entrepreneurial orientation, technology transfer and spinoff performance of U.S. universities

This paper adopts a resource-based perspective to understand why some universities are more successful than others at generating technology-based spinoff companies. In this respect, we derive eight hypotheses that link attributes of resources and capabilities, institutional, financial, commercial and human capital, to university spinoff outcomes. Using panel data from 1980 to 2001, our econometric estimators reveal evidence of history dependence for successful technology transfer to occur although faculty quality, size and orientation of science and engineering funding and commercial capability were also found to be predictors of university spinoff activity. We conclude by drawing implications for policy makers and university heads.     

Determinants of proactive and reactive technology licensing: A contingency perspective

Industrial firms increasingly attempt to license their technologies apart from applying them in their own products. Because of the imperfections in technology markets, an active approach towards technology licensing does not automatically result in licensing transactions. To balance prior research, which has focused on licensing transactions as the outcome of licensing intentions, we take a contingency view to analyze how characteristics of a firm's innovation ecosystem determine different strategic types of licensing. Specifically, we distinguish proactive licensing, which refers to identifying recipients for technology transactions, and reactive licensing, which relates to offering licenses to infringers of a firm's intellectual property. Survey data show that environmental antecedents concerning appropriability, i.e., patent protection and technological turbulence, and determinants regarding technology markets, i.e., transaction frequency and competitive intensity, have different effects on proactive and reactive licensing. On this basis, the article has major implications for research into technology licensing, markets for technology, and open innovation.     

Intangible assets and firm heterogeneity: Evidence from Italy

The positive impact of intangible assets on several measures of economic performance is well documented in the literature. Less clear is what initially leads firms to invest in intangible assets. The latter is particularly important because, at least for the Italian manufacturing sector, firms exhibit strong heterogeneity in their investments in intangible assets. In line with the capability-based theory of the firm, we argue that the firm's propensity to invest in intangible assets can be explained by factors that are internal and specific to the firm. Making use of a rich dataset, we test and provide support for our hypotheses. In particular, we find that the propensity to invest in intangible assets increases with the firm's size, human capital, and historical intangible asset base. This points towards the existence of a cumulative process of intangible asset accumulation, which may account for most of the heterogeneity observed in the data. The paper adds to the previous literature in two ways: first, it highlights the existence of strong intra-industry heterogeneity in intangible asset investments, and second, it offers an explanation for such heterogeneity.     

FRAND许可规则下标准化技术的治理研究

 首先介绍了知识产权与技术标准结合的研究背景,以及技术标准化实施中存在的专利丛林和专利劫持两类问题。针对以上问题,引出合作性技术标准化的组织形式和各自的职能。标准一经制定,相关专利权人往往凭借其市场力的提升,索取远高于自身专利技术价值的费用。有鉴于此,SSO为了规范标准技术市场提出了披露规则和FRAND规则。本文着重分析了在事后专利劫持、双边许可协商和事前技术竞争等经济情境下FRAND规则的多重含义。最后,以各种情境下专利权人和标准用户之间的制衡关系为基础,提出进一步的政策建议。     

The birth of a new industry: entry by start-ups and the drivers of firm growth: The case of encryption software

The paper analyses the birth of the encryption software industry (ESI), a new niche in the software industry. Using a Chandlerian perspective, this work reports the main facts about firm entry and growth, with a particular focus on start-up strategies and actions.Since scale economies do not play a major role in ESI, the paper investigates the different sources of firm competitive advantages.This work shows that innovation and product differentiation, along with investments in co-specialised assets, are variables strongly correlated to young firm probability to survive and grow. In doing so, we have collected highly detailed information on product introduction, US patents granted, worldwide alliances and biographical data of firm founders.     

Assessing the impact of organizational practices on the relative productivity of university technology transfer offices: an exploratory study

We present quantitative and qualitative evidence on the relative productivity of university technology transfer offices (TTOs). Our empirical results suggest that TTO activity is characterized by constant returns to scale and that environmental and institutional factors explain some of the variation in performance. Productivity may also depend on organizational practices. Unfortunately, there are no quantitative measures available on such practices, so we rely on inductive, qualitative methods to identify them. Based on 55 interviews of 98 entrepreneurs, scientists, and administrators at five research universities, we conclude that the most critical organizational factors are faculty reward systems, TTO staffing/compensation practices, and cultural barriers between universities and firms.     

Risk factors and mechanisms of technology and insignia copying—A first empirical approach

This paper examines the relationship between a firm's strategic framework and business environment and the probability of becoming the target of “copying”, differentiated into (i) unauthorized reproduction of its technological product elements or insignia, and (ii) patent and trademark infringement. Based on bivariate and multivariate analyses of survey data, we show patterns of the links between being (legally or illegally) imitated and IP protection (e.g., defensive publishing), general strategy (e.g., selling products abroad or off-shoring R&D activities) and organizational factors (e.g., firm size). Management implications for successful strategies against the different types of being copied are derived.     

University licensing and the flow of scientific knowledge

As university involvement in technology transfer and entrepreneurship has increased, concerns over the patenting and licensing of scientific discoveries have grown. This paper examines the effect that the licensing of academic patents has on journal citations to academic publications covering the same scientific research. We analyze data on invention disclosures, patents, and licenses from the University of California, a leading U.S. academic patenter and licensor, between 1997 and 2007. We also develop a novel “inventor-based” maximum-likelihood matching technique to automate and generalize Murray's (2002) “patent-paper pairs” methodology. We use this methodology to identify the scientific publications associated with University of California patents and licenses.Based on a “difference-in-differences” analysis, we find that within our sample of patented academic discoveries, citations to licensed patent-linked publications are higher in the three years after the license, although this difference is not statistically significant. We then disaggregate our sample into (a) patented discoveries that are likely to be used as “research tools” by other researchers (based on the presence of material transfer agreements (MTAs) that cover them) and (b) patented discoveries not covered by MTAs. Citations to publications linked to licensed patents in the latter subset (not covered by MTAs) are higher for publications linked to licensed patents, and this difference is statistically significant. In contrast, licensing of patented discoveries that are also research tools is associated with a reduction in citations to papers linked to these research advances, raising the possibility that licensing may restrict the flow of inputs to “follow-on” scientific research.     

Assessing the relative performance of U.K. university technology transfer offices: parametric and non-parametric evidence

We present evidence on the relative performance of U.K. university technology transfer offices (TTOs) using data envelopment analysis (DEA) and stochastic frontier estimation (SFE). U.K. TTOs are found to exhibit low-levels of absolute efficiency. There also appear to be decreasing returns to scale, implying that TTOs may need to be reconfigured into smaller units. The development of regionally-based sector focused TTOs is also advised. Consistent with qualitative evidence from U.S. TTOs, we find that there is a need to upgrade the business skills and capabilities of U.K. TTO managers and licensing officers.     

Transformative technology and institutional transformation: Coevolution of biotechnology venture firms and the institutional framework in Japan

Japan is developing a national strategy for biotechnology, which it sees as a transformative technology of strategic importance. Significant institutional transformation has occurred, including changes to the legal structure of universities, partly in an effort to enhance technology transfer. These and other institutional changes are proving conducive to entrepreneurship, and have developed alongside an increase in the number of biotechnology venture firms. This paper presents an overview of these institutional transformations, in the light of recent deregulation and legislative changes. It posits that the emergence of bioventure firms, the increase in their number and, arguably, their changing nature are manifestations of the coevolution of organizations with changes to the institutional framework. Finally, it gives examples of several bioventures, based on interviews conducted with the founders and chief scientists in Japan, and reveals some of the salient characteristics of these firms.     

The impact of public basic research on industrial innovation: Evidence from the pharmaceutical industry

While most economists believe that public scientific research fuels industry innovation and economic growth, systematic evidence supporting this relationship is surprisingly limited. In a recent study, Acemoglu and Linn (2004) identified market size as a significant driver of drug innovation in the pharmaceutical industry, but they did not find any evidence supporting science-driven innovation from publicly funded research. This paper uses new data on biomedical research investments by the U.S. National Institutes of Health (NIH) to examine the contribution of public research to pharmaceutical innovation. The empirical analysis finds that both market size and NIH funded basic research have economically and statistically significant effects on the entry of new drugs with the contribution of public basic research coming in the earliest stage of pharmaceutical drug discovery. The analysis also finds a positive return to public investment in basic biomedical research.     

Complementarities of innovation activities: An empirical analysis of the German manufacturing sector

Innovation strategies in manufacturing often involve internal R&D activities as well as external partnerships. Thereby it is not clear if internal and external activities are complements or substitutes. This paper tests for complementarity of different innovation activities, i.e. internal R&D, R&D contracting, and R&D cooperation. The empirical analysis of cross-sectional firm level data of the German manufacturing sector comprises both indirect and direct complementarity tests; it is based on data from the German part of the Community Innovation Survey (CIS 3). The results provide evidence for significant complementarities between internal R&D and R&D cooperation, but cast doubt on the complementarity of internal and contracted R&D, since a productivity effect on firms’ patenting probability or sales with new products cannot be found.     

Invention characteristics and the degree of exclusivity of university licenses: The case of two leading French research universities

This paper examines the determinants of university exclusive versus non-exclusive licenses. We specifically focus on the effect of the characteristics of the licensed invention (i.e. stage of development, specificity and appropriability). We rely on a unique and original dataset of 91 inventions contained in 62 intellectual property licensing contracts executed in the period of 2005–2014 by two leading French research universities. We cannot find a significant relation between the characteristics of the invention and the degree of exclusivity. In particular, as opposed to theoretical predictions, embryonic inventions are not significantly linked to more exclusive licenses and generic inventions are not significantly linked to non-exclusive licenses. Furthermore, inventions that are both generic and embryonic are not significantly linked to exclusive licenses per field of use. These results, although still exploratory, contribute to feed the discussion about the performance of university-industry technology transfer since they suggest that performance might be improved by taking more into account the characteristics of the licensed invention.     

Manufacturing dynamics and spillovers: The case of Guangdong Province and Hong Kong, Macau, and Taiwan (HKMT)

In this paper we characterize the extent of economic integration between Guangdong, Hong Kong, Macau, and Taiwan (HKMT). We do not find, for the period of 1999-2003, consistent evidence that economic activity on the part of HKMT-funded companies contributed to productivity growth in Guangdong domestic manufacturing firms. Furthermore, HKMT-funded companies were less active than Guangdong domestic companies in pursuing research and development (R&D) and innovation activities. Given that HKMT-funded companies in Guangdong are dominated by companies from Hong Kong, we end by linking our results to a discussion of recent innovation policy actions, both in Hong Kong SAR and Guangdong province.     

Inheriting knowledge and sustaining relationships: What stimulates the innovative performance of small software firms in the Netherlands?

Previous studies showed that firms established by experienced founders have higher survival rates and employment growth, but the potential effect of pre-entry experiences on innovation remains unclear. Using an original dataset, we examine the effect of founder's experiences, the relationship with the founder's previous employer and spatial proximity to the previous workplace on the innovative performance of small software firms in the Netherlands. Apart from entrepreneurial experiences, the results suggest no effect of pre-entry experiences. Continued contacts with the founder's previous employer appear to limit the firm's innovative performance, but firms do benefit from being established near the previous workplace.