We examine ownership patterns of German university-invented patents before and after the abolition of the "professors' privilege" in 2002 to explore how the legal change affected patenting activities. Our data show a shift from individually-owned and firm-owned patents to university-owned...

Empirical analyses suggest that the employment creating effect of start-ups is highest in regions with a low level of new business formation and that an increase in the regional start-up rate beyond a certain level may lead to negative employment effect. In explaining these results, we assume...

We analyze the emergence and spatial evolution of the German laser systems industry. Regional knowledge in the related field of laser sources, as well as the presence of universities with physics or engineering departments, is conducive to the emergence of laser systems suppliers. The regional...

Using a new dataset with detailed geographic information about licensing activities of the Max Planck Society, Germany's largest non-university public research organization, we analyze how the probability and magnitude of commercial success are affected by geographic distance between licensors...

This paper investigates the impact of new firms' quality on the magnitude of their employment effects. Our results clearly show that the quality of start-ups, measured by their affiliation with sectors and innovative industries, strongly influences the direct and the overall employment...