We study the innovation activity of firms going public and find that post-IPO innovation activity is highly associated with pre-IPO innovation activity at both venture-capital- and non-venture-capital-backed firms. This persistence in innovation suggests that firms' pre-IPO innovation experience...

We study innovation in newly public firms and find that VC-backing negatively impacts patent production and citations within the initial years of an IPO. Finding this effect to be more pronounced at firms with higher innovation activity pre-IPO, we conclude that this adverse impact is a...