Academic Inventors, Technological Profiles and

Patent Value:An Analysis of Academic Patents owned by

Swedish based firms

Evangelos Bourelos, PhDUniversity of Gothenburg

Daniel Ljungberg, LecturerUniversity of Gothenburg

Maureen McKelvey, ProfessorUniversity of Gothenburg

Academic Patents

Patent Value

ContributionAcademic vs Non-Academic Patents, owned by a firm

University

Corporate

Patents

Academic Patents

Non-Academic Patents

Focus on firm-owned patentsAcademic patents= At least 1 academic

inventor

Value= Citations

Academic PatentsNon-Academic Patents

Corporate

Patents

Academic Patenting in SwedenProfessor’s privilege80% owned by firms

Patent ValueSweden Italy France

0

2

4

6

8

10

4.2 3.9 3.9

Academic Inventors as % of total professors

Lissoni et al. 2008

Research nature and patent valueBasic vs Applied Research

Applied Resear

ch

Basic Resear

ch

Academic

Inventors

Firms

Focus on short-term returnsAcademic patents – higher long-term value

University-Industry CollaborationAcademic

Inventors

Inclination to science based

patents

Long-term value

Firms

Involve academics in

patents leading to immediate

returns

Short-term

Academic Patents VS

Non-academic Patents

Hypothesis 1

The effect of academic inventors on the value of firm-owned patents is differentiated over time, with an expected disadvantage in the short-term and an expected advantage in the long-term

Type of collaboration

Technology

University-Industry Collaboration

Patent

Core technology patents

Core: high resource

commitment by firm,

competitive advantage to

that technology

Non-core patents

Non-core patents

Non-core patents

Non-core patents

Higher patent valueLowe

r patent value

Hypothesis 2

Patents belonging to firms 'core technologies have higher value, as compared to patents in non-core technologies

Effect on academic patent’s valueAcademic inventor

Patent value

Technological profile

Effect on academic patent’s valueAcademic inventor

Patent value

Technological profile

Hypothesis 3

Controlling for whether patents belong to the core technologies of firms decreases the effect of academic inventors on patent value

Data

Firm owned academic and non academic

patents

PATSTAT-KITeS 1978-2009

Swedish inventor

Swedish patents

Firm-owned

Firm data (Orbis,

etc)KEINS/APE-INV

Dependent variables

Patent value: Total number of forward citations

Short-term patent value: The number of forward

citations within the first 3 years

Long-term patent value: The number of forward citations received after the first three

years

Independent variables• Binary 1/0• 1 if at least one academic

inventor

Academic

Inventors

• Binary 1/0• 1 if a patent is part of the

firm’s core technologies (Grandstrand et al. 1997)

Control variablesBackward patent citationsNon-patent referencesNumber of inventorsIPC classesFirm dummiesPriority year dummiesDummies for technological class

Descriptive statistics

0 5 10 15 20 25 300

1

2

3

4

5

6

Average citations/patent by age

Non-AcademicAcademic

Patent Age in Years

Cita

tion

s/pa

tent

Descriptive statisticsNon-academic patents Academic patents Difference % z-test P >

|z|

Short-term 0.93 0.82 -11.83* 0.0860

Long-term 1.37 1.48 8.03 0.2453

Total 2.30 2.30 0 0.9682

Table 3. Forward patent citations (FPCs) by inventorship: Mean citations per patent.

Econometric results  Short-term citations Long-term citations Total  (1) (2) (3) (4) (5) (6)  FPC<3 FPC<3 FPC>3 FPC>3 FPC FPC     +Core   +Core   +CoreAcademic inventor

-0.193*** -0.137* -0.139** -0.0791 -0.140** -0.0888

  (0.0722) (0.0720) (0.0581) (0.0584) (0.0557) (0.0557)Core technology  

0.420***

 

0.431***

 

0.405***

    (0.0322)   (0.0320)   (0.0273)BPC 0.0334*** 0.0368*** 0.0188*** 0.0222*** 0.0216*** 0.0252***  (0.00756) (0.00726) (0.00629) (0.00626) (0.00535) (0.00525)NPR 0.258*** 0.250*** 0.121*** 0.112*** 0.190*** 0.182***  (0.0357) (0.0353) (0.0361) (0.0361) (0.0302) (0.0301)#Inventors 0.0763*** 0.0711*** 0.0674*** 0.0610*** 0.0725*** 0.0671***  (0.0106) (0.0105) (0.0107) (0.0107) (0.00904) (0.00901)#IPC classes 0.147*** 0.161*** 0.135*** 0.152*** 0.136*** 0.151***

  (0.0139) (0.0140) (0.0128) (0.0129) (0.0113) (0.0113)Firm dummies included*** included*** included*** included*** included*** included***

Priority year included*** included*** included*** included*** included*** included***

OST7 included*** included** included*** included** included*** included***

Constant -0.940*** -1.217*** 0.835*** 0.578*** 0.943*** 0.692***  (0.167) (0.172) (0.128) (0.130) (0.118) (0.118)Observations 16,053 16,053 16,053 16,053 16,053 16,053

Negative Binomial regressions

Econometric resultsShor

t-term valu

e

Academic

Inventor

Short-

term valu

e

Academic

Inventor

Core

-0.193***

-0.137* 0.420***

Econometric resultsLong

-term valu

e

Academic

Inventor

Academic

Inventor

Core

Long-

term valu

e

-0.139**

-0.0791 0.431***

Econometric resultsPaten

t value

Academic

Inventor

Academic

Inventor

CorePaten

t value

-0.140**

-0.0888 0.405***

ConclusionsAcademic patents have higher long-term

value

Academic patents, owned by firm (and not comparing ownership), have lower short-term value but similar long-term

Firms might seek collaboration for short-term returns

ConclusionsPatent value is heavily dependent on

technological profile of the firmCore patents have higher valueTechnological profile an important control

when assessing academic patentingAcademic involvement per se is not adequate

to evaluate the patent valueTechnological profile and furthermore the

collaboration type has to be assessed

THANKS

Questions?