This paper studies the determinants of the quantity and quality of inventors’ patents. It uses a sample of 793 inventors drawn from the PatVal-EU dataset and the information on EPO patents that they contributed to inventing during the period 1988-1998. It explores three aspects of the...

From a survey of the inventors of 9,017 European patents, this paper provides new information about the characteristics of European inventors, the sources of their knowledge, the importance of formal and informal collaborations, the motivations to invent, and the actual use and economic value of...

Academics and policy makers are questioning about the relation between science and technology in the emerging field of nano science and technology (NST) and the effectiveness of different institutional regimes. We analyze the performance of inventors in the NST using multiple indicators. We...