This paper considers the impact of the intellectual property (IP) system on the timing of cooperation/licensing by start-up technology entrepreneurs. If the market for technology licenses is efficient, the timing of licensing is independent of whether IP has already been granted. In contrast,...

A firm that lacks the specialized complementary assets necessary to commercialize an innovation faces a trade-off between contracting with an incumbent to access those assets and integrating downstream into commercialization. According to the framework developed in the prior literature, under a...