(NO) PATENT, NO CASH? A RISK PERCEPTION PERSPECTIVE ON INVESTMENT MANAGERS’ ATTITUDES TOWARDS PATENTS

M. Knockaert (), A. Huyghe and Bart Clarysse

Working Papers of Faculty of Economics and Business Administration, Ghent University, Belgium from Ghent University, Faculty of Economics and Business Administration

Abstract: Employing a risk perception perspective, this paper studies the link between the investment manager’s human capital and his or her attitude towards the appropriability regime in the business proposal, and more specifically whether or not the technology is patent protected. Even though many researchers acknowledge the benefits related to patenting, agency theory suggests that patents may enlarge agency risk and may therefore result in VCs refraining from investing in proposals commercializing patented technology. We find that task-specific human capital, operationalized as the number of years experience as investment manager, positively affects the attitude towards patents. We find that some elements of general human capital, namely consulting experience, financial experience and entrepreneurial experience affect the attitude towards patents.

Keywords: venture capital; selection behaviour; appropriability; human capital; risk perception (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 37 pages
Date: 2011-01
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-ent, nep-hpe, nep-hrm, nep-ipr and nep-pr~
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:rug:rugwps:11/703

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