Not like the others: Frontier scientists for inventive performance

Linking scientific articles in PubMed and corporate biomedical U.S. patents, we study the role of inventors who are frontier scientists, identified as authors of recent articles in top-general biomedical journals. We find that inventions by these “frontier authors” receive more patent citations, are more likely to become technology hits, and have broad technology impact. They are also more likely to be internally further developed by the firm, hold greater private value, and feature broader claims—not only compared to inventions by non-author inventors but also to those by non-frontier authors, including “star” authors. This impact premium is especially strong in scaled-up young biopharmaceutical firms and for frontier authors internally employed at the patenting firm. To better understand the mechanism behind the impact premium of frontier-author patents, we analyze their boundary spanning role. We find that frontier-author patents are more likely to use and to be first users of frontier science. However, while frontier-author patents achieve peak impact when referencing frontier science, this advantage is comparable to other patents that reference frontier science. And as frontier-author patents also enjoy an impact premium on patents referencing other than frontier science, our results, thus, suggest that closeness to frontier science in only part of the story of the superior impact of inventions by frontier scientists.