IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/kap/jproda/v21y2004i2p167-181.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Technological Opportunity and Productivity of R&D Activities

Author

Listed:
  • Michael Fung

Abstract

Economists have managed to find a positive impact of R&D efforts on productivity. However, the empirical results of their studies have not explained the observed sectoral differences in this important impact. With due reference to three global industries, namely, chemical, computer, and electrical/electronic, the objective of this study is to evaluate the impact of technological opportunity on the productivity of R&D activities. Technological opportunity refers to the ease of achievement of innovations and technical improvements, which could be jointly represented by the intensities of knowledge spillovers, inter-firm research overlap and scope of research. In this study, the degree of technological opportunity is quantified by patent statistics. The empirical findings confirm a positive relationship between technological opportunity and the productivity of R&D effort, and the estimated rate of return falls within the range as reported by past studies. Copyright Kluwer Academic Publishers 2004

Suggested Citation

  • Michael Fung, 2004. "Technological Opportunity and Productivity of R&D Activities," Journal of Productivity Analysis, Springer, vol. 21(2), pages 167-181, March.
    • Handle: RePEc:kap:jproda:v:21:y:2004:i:2:p:167-181
    DOI: 10.1023/B:PROD.0000016871.95892.41
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://hdl.handle.net/10.1023/B:PROD.0000016871.95892.41
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1023/B:PROD.0000016871.95892.41?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Zvi Griliches, 1998. "Productivity, R&D, and Basic Research at the Firm Level in the 1970s," NBER Chapters, in: R&D and Productivity: The Econometric Evidence, pages 82-99, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    2. Adam B. Jaffe & Manuel Trajtenberg & Rebecca Henderson, 1993. "Geographic Localization of Knowledge Spillovers as Evidenced by Patent Citations," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 108(3), pages 577-598.
    3. Schankerman, Mark & Pakes, Ariel, 1986. "Estimates of the Value of Patent Rights in European Countries during the Post-1950 Period," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 96(384), pages 1052-1076, December.
    4. Minasian, Jora R, 1969. "Research and Development, Production Functions, and Rates of Return," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 59(2), pages 80-85, May.
    5. Bronwyn H. Hall & Adam B. Jaffe & Manuel Trajtenberg, 2001. "The NBER Patent Citation Data File: Lessons, Insights and Methodological Tools," NBER Working Papers 8498, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    6. Jean O. Lanjouw & Ariel Pakes & Jonathan Putnam, 1998. "How to Count Patents and Value Intellectual Property: The Uses of Patent Renewal and Application Data," Journal of Industrial Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 46(4), pages 405-432, December.
    7. Lach, Saul, 1995. "Patents and productivity growth at the industry level: A first look," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 49(1), pages 101-108, July.
    8. Giovanni Dosi, 1984. "Technical Change and Industrial Transformation," Palgrave Macmillan Books, Palgrave Macmillan, number 978-1-349-17521-5.
    9. Arundel, Anthony & Kabla, Isabelle, 1998. "What percentage of innovations are patented? empirical estimates for European firms," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 27(2), pages 127-141, June.
    10. Rebecca Henderson & Iain Cockburn, 1996. "Scale, Scope, and Spillovers: The Determinants of Research Productivity in Drug Discovery," RAND Journal of Economics, The RAND Corporation, vol. 27(1), pages 32-59, Spring.
    11. Hsiao, Cheng, 1975. "Some Estimation Methods for a Random Coefficient Model," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 43(2), pages 305-325, March.
    12. Joshua Lerner, 1994. "The Importance of Patent Scope: An Empirical Analysis," RAND Journal of Economics, The RAND Corporation, vol. 25(2), pages 319-333, Summer.
    13. Manuel Trajtenberg & Adam B. Jaffe & Michael S. Fogarty, 2000. "Knowledge Spillovers and Patent Citations: Evidence from a Survey of Inventors," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 90(2), pages 215-218, May.
    14. Zvi Griliches, 1998. "Patent Statistics as Economic Indicators: A Survey," NBER Chapters, in: R&D and Productivity: The Econometric Evidence, pages 287-343, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    15. Jacques Mairesse & Mohamed Sassenou, 1991. "R&D Productivity: A Survey of Econometric Studies at the Firm Level," NBER Working Papers 3666, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    16. John W. Kendrick & Beatrice N. Vaccara, 1980. "New Developments in Productivity Measurement and Analysis," NBER Books, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc, number kend80-1, March.
    17. Zvi Griliches, 1984. "R&D, Patents, and Productivity," NBER Books, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc, number gril84-1, March.
    18. Nadiri, M.I., 1993. "Innovations and Technological Spillovers," Working Papers 93-31, C.V. Starr Center for Applied Economics, New York University.
    19. Lanjouw, Jean O & Pakes, Ariel & Putnam, Jonathan, 1998. "How to Count Patents and Value Intellectual Property: The Uses of Patent Renewal and Application Data," Journal of Industrial Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 46(4), pages 405-432, December.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Arza,Valeria Luciana & Cirera,Xavier & Colonna,Agustina & Lopez,Emanuel, 2020. "Explaining Differences in the Returns to R&D in Argentina : The Role of Contextual Factors and Complementarities," Policy Research Working Paper Series 9219, The World Bank.
    2. David Grover, 2012. "Do market-based instruments really induce more environmental R&D? A test using US panel data," GRI Working Papers 98, Grantham Research Institute on Climate Change and the Environment.
    3. Yoon, Byungun & Park, Inchae & Coh, Byoung-youl, 2014. "Exploring technological opportunities by linking technology and products: Application of morphology analysis and text mining," Technological Forecasting and Social Change, Elsevier, vol. 86(C), pages 287-303.
    4. Hu, Mei-Chih & Kang, Jin-Su & Wu, Ching-Yan, 2017. "Determinants of profiting from innovation activities: Comparisons between technological leaders and latecomers," Technological Forecasting and Social Change, Elsevier, vol. 116(C), pages 223-236.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Choi, Mincheol & Lee, Chang-Yang, 2021. "Technological diversification and R&D productivity: The moderating effects of knowledge spillovers and core-technology competence," Technovation, Elsevier, vol. 104(C).
    2. Carlos J. Serrano, 2010. "The dynamics of the transfer and renewal of patents," RAND Journal of Economics, RAND Corporation, vol. 41(4), pages 686-708, December.
    3. Hall, Bronwyn H. & Mairesse, Jacques & Mohnen, Pierre, 2010. "Measuring the Returns to R&D," Handbook of the Economics of Innovation, in: Bronwyn H. Hall & Nathan Rosenberg (ed.), Handbook of the Economics of Innovation, edition 1, volume 2, chapter 0, pages 1033-1082, Elsevier.
    4. Ufuk Akcigit, 2009. "Firm Size, Innovation Dynamics and Growth," 2009 Meeting Papers 1267, Society for Economic Dynamics.
    5. Bronwyn H. Hall & Grid Thoma & Salvatore Torrisi, 2006. "The market value of patents and R&D: Evidence from European firms," KITeS Working Papers 186, KITeS, Centre for Knowledge, Internationalization and Technology Studies, Universita' Bocconi, Milano, Italy, revised Nov 2006.
    6. Stefan Lachenmaier, 2005. "Identification of Available and Desirable Indicators for Patent Systems, Patenting Processes and Patent Rights Research Project for the German Patent and Trademark Office," ifo Forschungsberichte, ifo Institute - Leibniz Institute for Economic Research at the University of Munich, number 25.
    7. Cohen, Wesley M., 2010. "Fifty Years of Empirical Studies of Innovative Activity and Performance," Handbook of the Economics of Innovation, in: Bronwyn H. Hall & Nathan Rosenberg (ed.), Handbook of the Economics of Innovation, edition 1, volume 1, chapter 0, pages 129-213, Elsevier.
    8. G Cameron, 1996. "Innovation and Economic Growth," CEP Discussion Papers dp0277, Centre for Economic Performance, LSE.
    9. Dibiaggio, Ludovic & Nasiriyar, Maryam & Nesta, Lionel, 2014. "Substitutability and complementarity of technological knowledge and the inventive performance of semiconductor companies," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 43(9), pages 1582-1593.
    10. Austin, David H., 2000. "Patents, Spillovers, and Competition in Biotechnology," Discussion Papers 10808, Resources for the Future.
    11. Barbieri, Nicolò & Marzucchi, Alberto & Rizzo, Ugo, 2020. "Knowledge sources and impacts on subsequent inventions: Do green technologies differ from non-green ones?," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 49(2).
    12. von Wartburg, Iwan & Teichert, Thorsten & Rost, Katja, 2005. "Inventive progress measured by multi-stage patent citation analysis," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 34(10), pages 1591-1607, December.
    13. M. Ishaq Nadiri, 1993. "Innovations and Technological Spillovers," NBER Working Papers 4423, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    14. Higham, Kyle & de Rassenfosse, Gaétan & Jaffe, Adam B., 2021. "Patent Quality: Towards a Systematic Framework for Analysis and Measurement," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 50(4).
    15. Laura Magazzini & Fabio Pammolli & Massimo Riccaboni, 2008. "Patent Value and R&D Competition," Working Papers 51/2008, University of Verona, Department of Economics.
    16. Manuel Acosta & Daniel Coronado & Esther Ferrándiz & Manuel Jiménez, 2022. "Effects of knowledge spillovers between competitors on patent quality: what patent citations reveal about a global duopoly," The Journal of Technology Transfer, Springer, vol. 47(5), pages 1451-1487, October.
    17. Leten, Bart & Kelchtermans, Stijn & Belderbos, Ren, 2010. "Internal Basic Research, External Basic Research and the Technological Performance of Pharmaceutical Firms," Working Papers 2010/12, Hogeschool-Universiteit Brussel, Faculteit Economie en Management.
    18. David Popp, 2005. "They Don't Invent Them Like They Used To: An Examination of Energy Patent Citations Over Time," NBER Working Papers 11415, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    19. repec:hal:spmain:info:hdl:2441/43aq8ffdqb82sbffkv69bt1eaa is not listed on IDEAS
    20. Mincheol Choi & Chang-Yang Lee, 2020. "Power-law distributions of corporate innovative output: evidence from U.S. patent data," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 122(1), pages 519-554, January.
    21. Appio, Francesco Paolo & Baglieri, Daniela & Cesaroni, Fabrizio & Spicuzza, Lucia & Donato, Alessia, 2022. "Patent design strategies: Empirical evidence from European patents," Technological Forecasting and Social Change, Elsevier, vol. 181(C).

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:kap:jproda:v:21:y:2004:i:2:p:167-181. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Sonal Shukla or Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.springer.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.