Thickets of partially overlapping patent rights raise costs to secure IPR for innovation. Fragmented IP ownership raises coordination costs to resolve mutual blockades. Inadvertent patent infringement poses the risk of fruits from investments to be exploited. A gap in economic commitment levels...

Innovation is commercialization of technology. Imperfections in markets for technology should leave marks on physical investments for innovation. Two types of transaction costs could affect innovative investments: royality stacking and hold-up threats. Backward references in firm's patent...

This paper investigates, both theoretically and empirically, the implications that complementary assets needed for the formation of start-ups – proxied by the ease of access to financial resources – have on the innovative efforts of incumbent firms. In particular, we develop a theoretical...

A significant part of the patents held by a firm are not used. We show that, given the uncertainty of invention quality at the patent application stage and the sunk cost incurred for obtaining and developing a patent, the patent (internal) utilization rate declines with the (anticipated) size of...

This paper argues that a linear model of technology transfer is no longer sufficient, or perhaps even no longer relevant, to account for the nuances and complexities of the technology transfer process that characterizes the ongoing commercialization activities of universities. Shortcomings of...

We study a dynamic general equilibrium model where innovation takes the form of the introduction of new goods whose production requires skilled workers. Innovation is followed by a costly process of standardization, whereby these new goods are adapted to be produced using unskilled labor. Our...

This paper looks at the special characteristics of radical inventions. It tries to identify those variables that differentiate radical inventions from non-radical inventions. Since radical inventions are very important for the economy as a whole and for the individual firm performances,...

The paper analyses the contribution of 'golden papers' - seminal works whose ideas remain as fresh and relevant today as when they were first published decades ago - and which continue to dominate academic discourse among successive generations of scholars. The authors analyse why two works...

The global pharmaceutical sector is highly patent intensive, and firms rely on product, process and formulation patents to protect their innovations. Intellectual property rights on pharmaceutical products, as contained in the Agreement on Trade Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights...

When companies decide to engage in technology transfer through licensing to other firms, they have two basic options: to use standard licensing contracts or to set-up more elaborate partnership-embedded licensing agreements. We find that broader partnership-embedded licensing agreements are...