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on Technology and Industrial Dynamics |
| By: | Tommy Clausen (Nordland Research Institute, Bodø) |
| Abstract: | In this paper we assess how important “industry” is to innovation. Our empirical estimates suggest that “industry factors” matter little to how firms’ search for new innovations. These results offer empirical support to recent evolutionary theory where firms have heterogeneous capabilities and pursue different approaches to innovation. Structural variables at the industry level do however have a substantial influence on the firm level propensity to innovate. This result supports “sectoral innovation system” approaches where firms are “constrained” by technological regimes underlying industry evolution. Hence, the driving forces behind technological evolution are found at both the firm and industry level. |
| Date: | 2008–04 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:tik:inowpp:20080410&r=tid |
| By: | Andersson, Martin (CESIS - Centre of Excellence for Science and Innovation Studies, Royal Institute of Technology); Lööf, Hans (CESIS - Centre of Excellence for Science and Innovation Studies, Royal Institute of Technology) |
| Abstract: | This paper examines small innovative entrepreneurs by contrasting patenting firms against non-patenting firms. The empirical analysis is based on new and unique data on internal attributes, location and international trade characteristics for over 20 000 manufacturing firms in Sweden with 1-25 employees. Our main findings are that firms’ access to financial means, human capital and trade with R&D-intensive economies correlate highly significant with their propensity to be engaged in innovation activities, as evidenced by patent applications. Interestingly, when controlling for firm attributes we do not find any significant effect of the local milieu on innovativeness among micro and very small firms. |
| Keywords: | Entrepreneurship; Innovation and Invention; Intellectual Property Rights; SMEs; Technology Transfer; Location; Agglomeration |
| JEL: | F43 L26 M13 O31 O34 |
| Date: | 2008–04–09 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hhs:cesisp:0127&r=tid |
| By: | Yves Breitmoser (Institute of Microeconomics, European University Viadrina); Jonathan H. W. Tan (Institute of Microeconomics, European University Viadrina); Daniel John Zizzo (Centre for Competition Policy, University of East Anglia) |
| Abstract: | This paper presents an experimental study of dynamic indefinite horizon R and D races with uncertainty and multiple prizes. The theoretical predictions are highly sensitive: small parameter changes determine whether technological competition is sustained, or converges into a market structure with an entrenched leadership and lower aggregate R&D. The subjects' strategies are far less sensitive. In most treatments the R&D races tend to converge to entrenched leadership. Investment is highest when rivals are close. This stylized fact, and so the usefulness of neck-to-neck competition in general, is largely unrelated to rivalry concerns but can be explained using a quantal response extension of Markov perfection. |
| Keywords: | R&D race, innovation, dynamics, experiment |
| JEL: | C72 C91 O31 |
| Date: | 2008–03 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ccp:wpaper:wp08-22&r=tid |
| By: | EL ELJ, Moez |
| Abstract: | In this paper, we analyze the incentives for improving-quality R&D in a two-tier marketstructure where the quality of a differentiated good depends on the specific R&D of a downstream oligopoly and the R&D of an upstream monopoly. We show that input pricing is determining for the incentives for innovation in upstream and downstream industry. Fixed price agreements promote innovation in downstream and upstream industry by eliminating the opportunistic behaviour of the input supplier and are welfare enhancing. Theses agreements are all the more effective as the weight of the quality of the input in the consumer’s perception of the total quality of the final good is significant and as the goods are strongly differentiated. |
| Keywords: | Product Innovation; Vertical Market - Technological Spillovers - Input pricing |
| JEL: | L13 D43 O31 |
| Date: | 2008–04–11 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pra:mprapa:8237&r=tid |
| By: | Czarnitzki, Dirk; Toole, Andrew A. |
| Abstract: | Real options investment theory predicts current investment falls as uncertainty about market returns increases. In the case of R&D investment, which is usually considered an irreversible form of investment, this effect should be quite pronounced. This paper tests the real options prediction about the R&D investment–uncertainty relationship and further considers how patent protection influences this relationship. Patent protection, by limiting the threat of market rivalry, should mitigate firm-specific uncertainty and stimulate current R&D investment. Our empirical results support both the prediction of real options theory and the mitigating effect of patent protection. |
| Keywords: | Real Options Theory, Uncertainty, R&D, Intellectual Property Protection, Censored Regression |
| JEL: | C25 O31 O33 |
| Date: | 2008 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:zbw:zewdip:7191&r=tid |
| By: | Carlos J. Serrano |
| Abstract: | This paper explores the dynamics of the transfer of U.S. patents and the significance of the initial missallocation of patent property rights. Here we find that the initial missallocation of patent property rights is large and differs substantially across patentees and technology fields. We also find that the probability of a patent being traded depends on a number of factors - the age of the patent, the number of citations received by a given age, the patent generality and whether the patent has been previously traded or not. We will also analyze and interpret this new evidence using a theoretical model of patent transfers and renewal. |
| JEL: | L1 O3 |
| Date: | 2008–04 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:nbr:nberwo:13938&r=tid |