The role of international collaborations in securing the patent grant

Our study examines whether patent applications with international collaborations are more likely to be awarded a US patent than applications without. The analysis focuses on the population (almost half a million) of patent applications over the period 2001–2009 at the USPTO and disclosed at least one EU located inventor and explicitly distinguish between countries with high and low number of patent applications. There are four important findings. First, inventor teams are more likely to be issued a patent than single inventors. Second, the presence of a US entity, either as inventor or owner, plays an important role in securing the grant. Third, for low innovative countries, international collaborations matter more for the likelihood of securing the patent grant than high innovative countries. Fourth, intense prosecution efforts will result to higher probability of patent grant. This paper adds to the growing literature that examines from the innovator’s viewpoint the likelihood of securing the patent grant.