Among the most prominent theoretical frameworks dealing with the economic underlyings of firms’ make-or-buy decisions are Transaction Cost Economics (TCE) and the Resourced Based View (RBV). Relying on panel data covering 107 European firms over eight years I test predictions from both TCE and...

There has been a wide-spread misconception based on the imprecise wording of Art. 52 of the European Patent Convention (EPC) that the protection of business methods by patents is prohibited in Europe. This paper investigates the legal framework set by patent laws with respect to the...

Recent studies of outlaw communities provide qualitative evidence of their existence and the organisation of the underlying innovation processes. We provide descriptive results from a large scale survey of two online outlaw communities focussing on Microsoft's XBox. In line with previous...

The existing literature identifies patent thickets indirectly. In this paper we propose a novel measure based on patent citations which allows us to measure the density of patent thickets directly. We discuss the algorithm which generates the measure and present descriptive results validating...

Patent-based measures are frequently used as indicators in empirical research on innovation and technological change. Currently, there is little evidence as to what extent patent-based indicators relate to product market outcomes. Using a unique dataset that links outcomes from product...

We link the hiring of R&D scientists from industry competitors to the subsequent formation of collaborative agreements, namely technology-oriented alliances. By transferring technological knowledge as well as cognitive elements to the hiring firm, mobile inventors foster the alignment of...

Kaum eine Fragestellung hat in der Finanzierungsliteratur der vergangenen Jahrzehnte eine sostarke und nachhaltige Beachtung gefunden, wie die der optimalen Kapitalstruktur vonUnternehmen. Der theoretische Literaturzweig ist weitgehend ausgereift und lässt sich imwesentlichen in zwei Lager...

Recent research argues that the management of intangible assets is a key to firms’ longtermsuccess and requires specialized management techniques and a distinctive set ofskills (Rivette & Kline 2000, Standfield 2002, Granstrand 1999). It is further arguedthat the active management of firms’...

There has been a wide-spread misconception based on the imprecisewording of Art. 52 of the European Patent Convention (EPC)that the protection of business methods by patents is prohibited inEurope. This paper investigates the legal framework set by patentlaws with respect to the patentability of...

We analyze the duration of the patent examination process at the EuropeanPatent Office (EPO). Our data contain information related to the patent’seconomic and technical relevance, EPO capacity and workload as well as novelcitation measures which are derived from the EPO’s search reports. In...