IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/kap/jtecht/v38y2013i3p251-272.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Licensing versus selling in transactions for exploiting patented technological knowledge assets in the markets for technology

Author

Listed:
  • Seongkyoon Jeong
  • Sungki Lee
  • Yeonbae Kim

Abstract

This paper examines the determinants of the types of technology transactions in the markets for technology. On the basis of the relationship between the characteristics of a firm’s patents and the firm’s decision on whether to license out or sell these patented technologies, we empirically analyze the determinants of the decision. We employ interlocked patent data from the representative Korean market for technology, the National Technology Bank, using a bivariate probit regression model in a theoretical framework that includes the option and transaction cost perspectives. Overall, the results show that the relationship between licensing and selling, the major alternatives in technology transactions, is strongly substitutive. The major finding of this study is that firms in markets for technology tend to prefer licensing their patents when uncertainty is low or transaction cost is high, whereas they tend to prefer selling their patents under opposite conditions. Copyright Springer Science+Business Media, LLC 2013

Suggested Citation

  • Seongkyoon Jeong & Sungki Lee & Yeonbae Kim, 2013. "Licensing versus selling in transactions for exploiting patented technological knowledge assets in the markets for technology," The Journal of Technology Transfer, Springer, vol. 38(3), pages 251-272, June.
    • Handle: RePEc:kap:jtecht:v:38:y:2013:i:3:p:251-272
    DOI: 10.1007/s10961-012-9252-0
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://hdl.handle.net/10.1007/s10961-012-9252-0
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1007/s10961-012-9252-0?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. Motohashi, Kazuyuki, 2008. "Licensing or not licensing? An empirical analysis of the strategic use of patents by Japanese firms," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 37(9), pages 1548-1555, October.
    2. Arora, Ashish & Fosfuri, Andrea, 2003. "Licensing the market for technology," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 52(2), pages 277-295, October.
    3. David J. TEECE, 2008. "Profiting from technological innovation: Implications for integration, collaboration, licensing and public policy," World Scientific Book Chapters, in: The Transfer And Licensing Of Know-How And Intellectual Property Understanding the Multinational Enterprise in the Modern World, chapter 5, pages 67-87, World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd..
    4. Gambardella, Alfonso & Giuri, Paola & Luzzi, Alessandra, 2007. "The market for patents in Europe," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 36(8), pages 1163-1183, October.
    5. 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.
    6. Vittorio Chiesa & Raffaella Manzini & Emanuele Pizzurno, 2008. "The market for technological intangibles: a conceptual framework for commercial transactions," International Journal of Learning and Intellectual Capital, Inderscience Enterprises Ltd, vol. 5(2), pages 186-207.
    7. Bronwyn H. Hall & Adam Jaffe & Manuel Trajtenberg, 2005. "Market Value and Patent Citations," RAND Journal of Economics, The RAND Corporation, vol. 36(1), pages 16-38, Spring.
    8. Hicks, Diana & Hegde, Deepak, 2005. "Highly innovative small firms in the markets for technology," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 34(5), pages 703-716, June.
    9. B. Wade Brorsen & Michael R. Dicks & W. Bryan Just, 1996. "Regional and Farm Structure Effects of Planting Flexibility," Review of Agricultural Economics, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association, vol. 18(3), pages 341-351.
    10. Patel, Pari & Pavitt, Keith, 1997. "The technological competencies of the world's largest firms: Complex and path-dependent, but not much variety," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 26(2), pages 141-156, May.
    11. Bruce Kogut, 1991. "Joint Ventures and the Option to Expand and Acquire," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 37(1), pages 19-33, January.
    12. Arora, Ashish & Fosfuri, Andrea & Gambardella, Alfonso, 2001. "Markets for Technology and Their Implications for Corporate Strategy," Industrial and Corporate Change, Oxford University Press and the Associazione ICC, vol. 10(2), pages 419-451, June.
    13. 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.
    14. William H. Greene, 1998. "Gender Economics Courses in Liberal Arts Colleges: Further Results," The Journal of Economic Education, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 29(4), pages 291-300, January.
    15. Jean O. Lanjouw & Mark Schankerman, 1999. "The Quality of Ideas: Measuring Innovation with Multiple Indicators," NBER Working Papers 7345, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    16. Bessen, James, 2008. "The value of U.S. patents by owner and patent characteristics," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 37(5), pages 932-945, June.
    17. Arora, Ashish, 1996. "Contracting for tacit knowledge: the provision of technical services in technology licensing contracts," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 50(2), pages 233-256, August.
    18. Dietmar Harhoff & Francis Narin & F. M. Scherer & Katrin Vopel, 1999. "Citation Frequency And The Value Of Patented Inventions," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 81(3), pages 511-515, August.
    19. Gary Hamel, 1991. "Competition for competence and interpartner learning within international strategic alliances," Strategic Management Journal, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 12(S1), pages 83-103, June.
    20. Tripsas, Mary & Schrader, Stephan & Sobrero, Maurizio, 1995. "Discouraging opportunistic behavior in collaborative R & D: A new role for government," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 24(3), pages 367-389, May.
    21. Neus Palomeras, 2007. "An Analysis of Pure‐Revenue Technology Licensing," Journal of Economics & Management Strategy, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 16(4), pages 971-994, 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. Bernadette Power & Gavin C Reid, 2021. "The Impact of Intellectual Property Types on the Performance of Business Start-ups in the USA," Working Papers wp523, Centre for Business Research, University of Cambridge.
    2. Liu, Weiwei & Tao, Yuan & Bi, Kexin, 2022. "Capturing information on global knowledge flows from patent transfers: An empirical study using USPTO patents," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 51(5).
    3. Seongkyoon Jeong & Jong-Chan Kim & Jae Young Choi, 2015. "Technology convergence: What developmental stage are we in?," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 104(3), pages 841-871, September.
    4. Caviggioli, Federico & De Marco, Antonio & Montobbio, Fabio & Ughetto, Elisa, 2020. "The licensing and selling of inventions by US universities," Technological Forecasting and Social Change, Elsevier, vol. 159(C).
    5. Hossain, Mokter & Simula, Henri, 2017. "Recycling the unused ideas and technologies of a large corporation into new business by start-ups," Technology in Society, Elsevier, vol. 48(C), pages 11-18.
    6. Seongkyoon Jeong & Sungki Lee, 2015. "Strategic timing of academic commercialism: evidence from technology transfer," The Journal of Technology Transfer, Springer, vol. 40(6), pages 910-931, December.
    7. Naubahar Sharif, 2018. "To License or Sell: A Study on the Patent Transaction Modes in China," HKUST IEMS Working Paper Series 2018-51, HKUST Institute for Emerging Market Studies, revised Jan 2018.
    8. Hung-Chun Huang & Hsin-Yu Shih & Tsung-Han Ke, 2017. "Structure of a patent transaction network," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 111(1), pages 25-45, April.
    9. Rosa Caiazza & Aileen Richardson & David Audretsch, 2015. "Knowledge effects on competitiveness: from firms to regional advantage," The Journal of Technology Transfer, Springer, vol. 40(6), pages 899-909, December.
    10. Yuandi Wang & Xin Pan & Lutao Ning & Jian Li & Jin Chen, 2015. "Technology exchange patterns in China: an analysis of regional data," The Journal of Technology Transfer, Springer, vol. 40(2), pages 252-272, April.
    11. Yutao Sun & Chen Zhang & Robert A. W. Kok, 2020. "The role of research outcome quality in the relationship between university research collaboration and technology transfer: empirical results from China," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 122(2), pages 1003-1026, February.
    12. Christian Corsi & Antonio Prencipe, 2018. "The Contribution of University Spin-Offs to the Competitive Advantage of Regions," Journal of the Knowledge Economy, Springer;Portland International Center for Management of Engineering and Technology (PICMET), vol. 9(2), pages 473-499, June.
    13. Kwon, Seokbeom, 2020. "How does patent transfer affect innovation of firms?," Technological Forecasting and Social Change, Elsevier, vol. 154(C).
    14. Bangjuan Wang & Weisheng Mao & Junxian Piao & Chengliang Liu, 2023. "Does external linkage stimulate innovation capacity? The analysis based on “dual‐pipelines” framework," Papers in Regional Science, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 102(3), pages 613-633, June.

    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. Lichtenthaler, Ulrich, 2010. "Determinants of proactive and reactive technology licensing: A contingency perspective," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 39(1), pages 55-66, February.
    2. Caviggioli, Federico & De Marco, Antonio & Montobbio, Fabio & Ughetto, Elisa, 2020. "The licensing and selling of inventions by US universities," Technological Forecasting and Social Change, Elsevier, vol. 159(C).
    3. 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).
    4. Barirani, Ahmad & Beaudry, Catherine & Agard, Bruno, 2017. "Can universities profit from general purpose inventions? The case of Canadian nanotechnology patents," Technological Forecasting and Social Change, Elsevier, vol. 120(C), pages 271-283.
    5. Ming Li & Xiangdong Chen & Gupeng Zhang, 2017. "How does firm size affect technology licensing? Empirical evidence from China," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 112(3), pages 1249-1269, September.
    6. Nicolas van Zeebroeck, 2009. "From patent renewals to applications survival: do portfolio management strategies play a role in patent length?," Working Papers CEB 09-028.RS, ULB -- Universite Libre de Bruxelles.
    7. Choi, Donghyuk & Kim, Yeonbae, 2018. "Market share and firms’ patent exploitation," Technovation, Elsevier, vol. 72, pages 13-23.
    8. Mohd Shadab Danish & Pritam Ranjan & Ruchi Sharma, 2021. "Identification of “Valuable” Technologies via Patent Statistics in India: An Analysis Based on Renewal Information," BASE University Working Papers 13/2021, BASE University, Bengaluru, India.
    9. Antonio Messeni Petruzzelli & Daniele Rotolo & Vito Albino, 2014. "Determinants of Patent Citations in Biotechnology: An Analysis of Patent Influence Across the Industrial and Organizational Boundaries," SPRU Working Paper Series 2014-05, SPRU - Science Policy Research Unit, University of Sussex Business School.
    10. Seongkyoon Jeong & Sungki Lee, 2015. "Strategic timing of academic commercialism: evidence from technology transfer," The Journal of Technology Transfer, Springer, vol. 40(6), pages 910-931, December.
    11. Lee, Honggi, 2023. "The heterogeneous effects of patent scope on licensing propensity," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 52(3).
    12. Maria Chiara Di Guardo & Kathryn Rudie Harrigan & Elona Marku, 2019. "M&A and diversification strategies: what effect on quality of inventive activity?," Journal of Management & Governance, Springer;Accademia Italiana di Economia Aziendale (AIDEA), vol. 23(3), pages 669-692, September.
    13. Nagaoka, Sadao & Motohashi, Kazuyuki & Goto, Akira, 2010. "Patent Statistics as an Innovation Indicator," 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 1083-1127, Elsevier.
    14. repec:wip:wpaper:3 is not listed on IDEAS
    15. Gambardella, Alfonso & Giuri, Paola & Luzzi, Alessandra, 2007. "The market for patents in Europe," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 36(8), pages 1163-1183, October.
    16. Huang, Kenneth Guang-Lih & Huang, Can & Shen, Huijun & Mao, Hao, 2021. "Assessing the value of China's patented inventions," Technological Forecasting and Social Change, Elsevier, vol. 170(C).
    17. Krammer, Sorin M.S., 2016. "The role of diversification profiles and dyadic characteristics in the formation of technological alliances: Differences between exploitation and exploration in a low-tech industry," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 45(2), pages 517-532.
    18. Giuri, Paola & Mariani, Myriam, 2007. "Inventors and invention processes in Europe: Results from the PatVal-EU survey," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 36(8), pages 1105-1106, October.
    19. Noh, Heeyong & Lee, Sungjoo, 2020. "What constitutes a promising technology in the era of open innovation? An investigation of patent potential from multiple perspectives," Technological Forecasting and Social Change, Elsevier, vol. 157(C).
    20. Federico Munari & Maurizio Sobrero, 2011. "Economic and Management Perspectives on the Value of Patents," Chapters, in: Federico Munari & Raffaele Oriani (ed.), The Economic Valuation of Patents, chapter 3, Edward Elgar Publishing.
    21. Nicole Ziegler & Frauke Ruether & Martin Bader & Oliver Gassmann, 2013. "Creating value through external intellectual property commercialization: a desorptive capacity view," The Journal of Technology Transfer, Springer, vol. 38(6), pages 930-949, December.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Technology transfer; Market for technology; Technology exploitation strategy; Technology licensing; C35; D22; D81;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • C35 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Multiple or Simultaneous Equation Models; Multiple Variables - - - Discrete Regression and Qualitative Choice Models; Discrete Regressors; Proportions
    • D22 - Microeconomics - - Production and Organizations - - - Firm Behavior: Empirical Analysis
    • D81 - Microeconomics - - Information, Knowledge, and Uncertainty - - - Criteria for Decision-Making under Risk and Uncertainty

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    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:jtecht:v:38:y:2013:i:3:p:251-272. 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.