R&D portfolios in environmentally friendly automotive propulsion: Variety, competition and policy implications

In this article, we analyze R&D portfolios in environmentally friendly automotive propulsion including alternative fuel options. We argue that at the current stage of development, substitution of conventional car technology by a new automotive propulsion technology may lead to premature lock-in of suboptimal technology. To avoid such lock-in, one should value the variety of current R&D activity that enables organizations to learn from multiple options and to create spillovers between options. We further argue that the existence of technological variety is not a sufficient condition to avoid lock-in. Organizational variety is also required to sustain competition and avoid the dominance of few firms that possibly enforce a suboptimal technology within the sector. To assess whether recent developments in R&D have led to both technological variety and organizational competition, we analyze United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) patents in low-emission vehicles (LEVs) during the period 1980–2001 using entropy statistics. Results show that both technological variety and organizational competition have increased steadily since the early nineties, suggesting that premature lock-in is unlikely to occur. From an environmental policy evaluation perspective, we consider the findings as a positive evaluation of the 1990 Californian Low Emission Vehicle program.     

An unsuccessful initiative to create a buying centre

An organization’s effectiveness depends on its ability to adapt its structures to new situations. This holds crucially true for small companies, constrained by their resources and capacities. The interest of five small local companies for setting up a united buying centre with which respond to the ever-changing market is described. Greater and better knowledge of the potential suppliers’ pool, improved purchasing prices, greater negotiating power, access to more appropriate technology and improved overall operations, all figured amongst the advantages of this initiative. However, despite the apparent importance of these advantages, the study pinpoints a number of obstacles and a range of behavioural traits amongst the members involved that would make the project unfeasible as a tool for achieving them.     

A Repeatable E-Collaboration Process Based on ThinkLets for Multi-Organization Strategy Development

In recent years, multi-organizational collaboration has become more and more important in both business and research. We conducted an action research (AR) intervention with a consortium of Finnish universities that needed to revise its joint strategy. We designed and facilitated a repeatable collaboration process for this multi-organizational strategy development. The process was built using the Collaboration Engineering (CE) approach with thinkLets, which provides expert-level advice for novice facilitators, and it was powered by Group Support Systems (GSS). Our overall impression of CE’s ability to provide valuable design and facilitation support for complex processes is very affirmative. The consortium was satisfied with the intervention, as it saved huge amounts of time compared with conventional strategic work. The process was also seen as more democratic, because the GSS tools enabled equal participation during the session. Our study also provides a ready-to-apply CE process recipe to organizations for revising their strategy. Through this recipe, supplemented with knowledge on thinkLets, the strategy development process may easily be repeated by other facilitators or even practitioners.     

On the measurement of patent stock as knowledge indicators

Most of the conventional indicators for measuring the amount of technological knowledge (TK) have so far been input-based indicators. Hence, there is growing need to develop output-based indicators, and accordingly some studies have been conducted thereon. However, previous research has adopted patent count or patent stock by simple count in measuring the amount of TK as output-based indicators. The principal problem with using this variable is that the value of individual patent is too heterogeneous. That is a large portion of these patent databases are either of little value or nothing at all. As a result, patent count or patent stock by simple count cannot be seen as a suitable measure of TK.In this study, we attempted to resolve the value-heterogeneity problem in measuring patent stock. The notion of citation-based patent stock (CPS) and valuation-based patent stock (VPS) is proposed in this paper and the calculation method is described in detail. In CPS, the economic value of individual patent is assumed to be proportional to the number of citations received from other patents. And in VPS, the economic value of individual patent is derived from the value distribution of patents registered in some cohort by manipulating the patent renewal data. We validated the indicators by comparing them with the usual input-based indicators and by analyzing the relationships between them and the productivity growth empirically.     

我国专利法调整对研发投入的激励作用:基于各省数据的实证分析

随着人们对经济转型中创新要素作用认识的加深,使得创新活动成为全社会的关注热点和政策焦点。知识产权立法的目的是促进研发资金投入,但如何顺利实现该目标,一直是学术界的热门议题。部分学者认为专利保护应当与国家特定发展阶段相适应,而我国现阶段制度调整是否有效促进了创新活动值得商榷。基于2002-2014年全国内地31个省级行政单位的面板数据,对影响各地研发投入的变量进行了回归分析,结果表明:虽然2008年知识产权法修订进一步明晰了产权、加强了专利保护,但相对各地经济发展水平、中央科研项目投入情况、高科技企业主营收入情况等其它因素而言,知识产权法的修订对各地方研发投入的影响并无正相关性。该结果表明,创新是系统而复杂的活动,专利保护立法应与特定的发展阶段相适应,在现阶段需要配套性的政策措施才能更好地促进创新发展。     

OPEN KNOWLEDGE DISCLOSURE: AN OVERVIEW OF THE EVIDENCE AND ECONOMIC MOTIVATIONS

Abstract.  This paper reviews current literature on open knowledge disclosure strategies used by firms. It is usually acknowledged that for an innovative firm that does not benefit from a natural protection (such as lead time advance) the best strategy is to keep an innovation secret as long as possible or to protect it through an exclusive patent. However, in apparent contrast to this traditional view, many studies suggest that firms often disclose important parts of their knowledge through scientific publications, conferences, the Internet, etc. This paper aims to provide an overview first of the evidence supporting the existence of open knowledge disclosure and second of the economic motivations that encourage rational, profit seeking firms to adopt these behaviours.     

浅谈专利文献的竞争情报价值——诺基亚公司在中国的专利申请分析报告

文中简要介绍了专利信息和专利分析方法,再以诺基亚公司为例,通过使用中华人民共和国国家知识产权局提供的专利数据库,对诺基亚公司在中国申请的专利进行分析,得出专利情报,从而揭示专利信息的竞争情报价值。     

Nanopatenting patterns in relation to product life cycle

This paper compares the positions of national nanotechnology development efforts based on analyses of patenting from 1994 to 2005. Searching Derwent world patent index files, 19,351 unique patents are collected based on a composite search algorithm. These abstract records are categorized multiple ways — by top patent assignees, by International Patent Classifications, and through content analyses of the “Use” subfield. We classify the R&D activities by using a 3-stage, life cycle, value chain of nano-raw materials, nanointermediates, and nano-products. Profiles of Japanese, American (US), and European (German) emphases show notable differences in concentration and value chain niche. Such characterizations offer significant research management and policy implications.     

A patent race in a real options setting: Investment strategy, valuation, CAPM beta, and return volatility

In this paper, we study financial properties of R&D intensive firms through a continuous-time real-options patent-race model. Numerical analysis in this study shows that intense competition drives a firm to invest more aggressively, which then pushes up its cost of capital and return volatility while introducing negative return correlation with its competitor. Furthermore, we find that a firm's position in competition has important impacts on its financial properties. For instance, a firm's cost of capital is a non-monotonic function of its relative position in the race. In addition, the relationship between cash flow uncertainty and investment can be negative when a firm is far ahead or far behind, or positive when firms are close in the race.     

Strategic sourcing and corporate social responsibility: Aligning a healthcare organization's strategic objectives

Strategic sourcing has long been utilized by organizations to maximize budget efficiency. The process includes a spend analysis, which historically has been performed by identifying the commodities and services purchased that resulted in the greatest spend, and establishing contracts with suppliers for these items in an effort to decrease the overall price through quantity discounts. This process restricts the data used in the spend analysis process to basic transactional information, and has not considered corporate social responsibility objectives as part of the strategic sourcing process. This paper modifies an existing spend analysis process framework, and applies the framework in a case study that uses additional data points to identify opportunities that allow an organization to simultaneously achieve both strategic purchasing and social responsibility objectives. The case study uses healthcare purchasing data from eight Department of Veterans Affairs medical centers. The goal of the model generated using regression analysis in the case study is to determine the buy characteristics that are most likely to generate mandated savings within the medical centers, in conjunction with achieving sustainability goals. The extensions of the regression model were examined to determine how collaborative buyer/supplier relationships can achieve organizational strategic objectives.