The Nature of Collaborative Patenting Activities

Roberto Fontana and Aldo Geuna

Department of Economics and Statistics Cognetti de Martiis LEI & BRICK - Laboratory of Economics of Innovation "Franco Momigliano", Bureau of Research in Innovation, Complexity and Knowledge, Collegio Carlo Alberto. WP series from University of Turin

Abstract: We investigate the reasons why different governance modes are used in a sample of successful collaborative patenting activities in Europe. First we show that collaboration activities in the patenting process are much more common than one may expect by l ooking only at information on co-assignment. Indeed, collaborative patenting activity accounts for more than a quarter of all patents in our sample. This figure is about eight times higher than that from co-assignment data (usually considered to assess cooperation in patenting). We then examine the impact of organizational, individual and project determinants on the choice of three possible modes of governance: coassignment,co-invention, collaborative agreement. We find that higher project complexity and technological scope are associated to tighter modes of governance. We also find a significant negative relationship between licensing and co-assignment, thus providing some support to the view that some licensing can be the result of ex-ante legal agreements rather than of the presence of a market for technology. Finally, inventor specific characteristics matter too. In particular, age increases the probability of choosing looser governance modes while better education is associated to tighter modes.

Pages: 46 pages
Date: 2009-06
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-ino, nep-ipr, nep-pr~ and nep-ppm
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (5)

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