IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/kap/jtecht/v49y2024i4d10.1007_s10961-023-10050-w.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Open disclosure using invention pledges: a case study of IBM

Author

Listed:
  • Ajay Bhaskarabhatla

    (Erasmus University Rotterdam)

  • Yiting Deng

    (UCL School of Management, University College London)

  • Yongdong Liu

    (UCL School of Management, University College London)

Abstract

We study the nature and consequences of IBM’s invention pledge program, the largest of its kind in US history. Invention pledges involve the open disclosure of patentable inventions without seeking patent protection, unlike patent pledges for which firms waive patent rights after patenting. Competing theoretical views characterize invention pledges either as low-quality inventions with poor organizational fit or as patentable inventions pledged openly by firms with weak firm-specific patent rights and lead-time advantages. We test these theoretical claims using a novel method that compares the quality of subsequent patents citing IBM invention pledges with similar others. Citing IBM invention pledges is positively correlated with patent quality, inconsistent with theories of adverse selection. IBM patents cite its invention pledges on average two years before others, consistent with private benefits of open disclosure. Cited invention pledges spur follow-on innovation, further highlighting their social benefits. We discuss the generalizability of our results obtained using the sample of cited invention pledges to uncited invention pledges. Overall, our results highlight the tradeoffs firms face between knowledge protection and disclosure and generalize to a small number of other disclosing firms.

Suggested Citation

  • Ajay Bhaskarabhatla & Yiting Deng & Yongdong Liu, 2024. "Open disclosure using invention pledges: a case study of IBM," The Journal of Technology Transfer, Springer, vol. 49(4), pages 1532-1566, August.
    • Handle: RePEc:kap:jtecht:v:49:y:2024:i:4:d:10.1007_s10961-023-10050-w
    DOI: 10.1007/s10961-023-10050-w
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://link.springer.com/10.1007/s10961-023-10050-w
    File Function: Abstract
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1007/s10961-023-10050-w?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. Ashish Arora & Sharon Belenzon & Andrea Patacconi & Jungkyu Suh, 2020. "The Changing Structure of American Innovation: Some Cautionary Remarks for Economic Growth," Innovation Policy and the Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 20(1), pages 39-93.
    2. Iain M. Cockburn & Rebecca M. Henderson, 1998. "Absorptive Capacity, Coauthoring Behavior, and the Organization of Research in Drug Discovery," Journal of Industrial Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 46(2), pages 157-182, June.
    3. Philippe Aghion & Mathias Dewatripont & Jeremy C. Stein, 2008. "Academic freedom, private‐sector focus, and the process of innovation," RAND Journal of Economics, RAND Corporation, vol. 39(3), pages 617-635, September.
    4. David Gill, 2008. "Strategic Disclosure of Intermediate Research Results," Journal of Economics & Management Strategy, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 17(3), pages 733-758, September.
    5. 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..
    6. Wallace P. Mullin & Christopher M. Snyder, 2021. "A Simple Method for Bounding the Elasticity of Growing Demand with Applications to the Analysis of Historic Antitrust Cases," American Economic Journal: Microeconomics, American Economic Association, vol. 13(4), pages 172-217, November.
    7. Hart, David M., 2001. "Antitrust and technological innovation in the US: ideas, institutions, decisions, and impacts, 1890-2000," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 30(6), pages 923-936, June.
    8. Heidi L. Williams, 2017. "How Do Patents Affect Research Investments?," Annual Review of Economics, Annual Reviews, vol. 9(1), pages 441-469, September.
    9. Fiona Murray & Philippe Aghion & Mathias Dewatripont & Julian Kolev & Scott Stern, 2016. "Of Mice and Academics: Examining the Effect of Openness on Innovation," American Economic Journal: Economic Policy, American Economic Association, vol. 8(1), pages 212-252, February.
    10. Martin Watzinger & Thomas A. Fackler & Markus Nagler & Monika Schnitzer, 2020. "How Antitrust Enforcement Can Spur Innovation: Bell Labs and the 1956 Consent Decree," American Economic Journal: Economic Policy, American Economic Association, vol. 12(4), pages 328-359, November.
    11. Bronwyn H. Hall, 2005. "Exploring the Patent Explosion," Springer Books, in: Albert N. Link & F. M. Scherer (ed.), Essays in Honor of Edwin Mansfield, pages 195-208, Springer.
    12. B. Curtis Eaton & Mukesh Eswaran, 2001. "Know-how sharing with stochastic innovations," Canadian Journal of Economics, Canadian Economics Association, vol. 34(2), pages 525-548, May.
    13. Mowery, David C., 1992. "The U.S. national innovation system: Origins and prospects for change," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 21(2), pages 125-144, April.
    14. Corey C. Phelps & Hongyan Yang & Kevin Steensma, 2010. "Learning from what others have learned from you: The effects of knowledge spillovers on originating firms," Post-Print hal-00528393, HAL.
    15. Thomas Hellmann & Enrico Perotti, 2011. "The Circulation of Ideas in Firms and Markets," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 57(10), pages 1813-1826, October.
    16. Bruno Cassiman & Masako Ueda, 2006. "Optimal Project Rejection and New Firm Start-ups," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 52(2), pages 262-275, February.
    17. Josh Lerner, 2009. "The Empirical Impact of Intellectual Property Rights on Innovation: Puzzles and Clues," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 99(2), pages 343-348, May.
    18. Jeffrey L. Furman & Markus Nagler & Martin Watzinger, 2021. "Disclosure and Subsequent Innovation: Evidence from the Patent Depository Library Program," American Economic Journal: Economic Policy, American Economic Association, vol. 13(4), pages 239-270, November.
    19. Petra Moser & Alessandra Voena, 2012. "Compulsory Licensing: Evidence from the Trading with the Enemy Act," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 102(1), pages 396-427, February.
    20. Deepak Hegde & Hong Luo, 2018. "Patent Publication and the Market for Ideas," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 64(2), pages 652-672, February.
    21. Gambardella, Alfonso, 1992. "Competitive advantages from in-house scientific research: The US pharmaceutical industry in the 1980s," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 21(5), pages 391-407, October.
    22. James Bessen & Eric Maskin, 2009. "Sequential innovation, patents, and imitation," RAND Journal of Economics, RAND Corporation, vol. 40(4), pages 611-635, December.
    23. Wesley M. Cohen & Richard R. Nelson & John P. Walsh, 2000. "Protecting Their Intellectual Assets: Appropriability Conditions and Why U.S. Manufacturing Firms Patent (or Not)," NBER Working Papers 7552, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    24. Hall, Bronwyn H & Ziedonis, Rosemarie Ham, 2001. "The Patent Paradox Revisited: An Empirical Study of Patenting in the U.S. Semiconductor Industry, 1979-1995," RAND Journal of Economics, The RAND Corporation, vol. 32(1), pages 101-128, Spring.
    25. Hicks, Diana, 1995. "Published Papers, Tacit Competencies and Corporate Management of the Public/Private Character of Knowledge," Industrial and Corporate Change, Oxford University Press and the Associazione ICC, vol. 4(2), pages 401-424.
    26. James J. Anton & Dennis A. Yao, 2004. "Little Patents and Big Secrets: Managing Intellectual Property," RAND Journal of Economics, The RAND Corporation, vol. 35(1), pages 1-22, Spring.
    27. Sakakibara, Mariko & Branstetter, Lee, 2001. "Do Stronger Patents Induce More Innovation? Evidence from the 1988 Japanese Patent Law Reforms," RAND Journal of Economics, The RAND Corporation, vol. 32(1), pages 77-100, Spring.
    28. Sharon Belenzon, 2012. "Cumulative Innovation and Market Value: Evidence from Patent Citations," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 122(559), pages 265-285, March.
    29. Gonçalo Pacheco‐de‐Almeida & Peter B. Zemsky, 2012. "Some like it free: Innovators' Strategic use of Disclosure to slow down Competition," Strategic Management Journal, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 33(7), pages 773-793, July.
    30. Manuel Trajtenberg & Rebecca Henderson & Adam Jaffe, 1997. "University Versus Corporate Patents: A Window On The Basicness Of Invention," Economics of Innovation and New Technology, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 5(1), pages 19-50.
    31. Henry Sauermann & Wesley M. Cohen, 2010. "What Makes Them Tick? Employee Motives and Firm Innovation," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 56(12), pages 2134-2153, December.
    32. Bhaven Sampat & Heidi L. Williams, 2019. "How Do Patents Affect Follow-On Innovation? Evidence from the Human Genome," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 109(1), pages 203-236, January.
    33. De Fraja, Giovanni, 1993. "Strategic spillovers in patent races," International Journal of Industrial Organization, Elsevier, vol. 11(1), pages 139-146, March.
    34. Scott Stern, 2004. "Do Scientists Pay to Be Scientists?," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 50(6), pages 835-853, June.
    35. Cotropia, Christopher A. & Lemley, Mark A. & Sampat, Bhaven, 2013. "Do applicant patent citations matter?," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 42(4), pages 844-854.
    36. Ajay Bhaskarabhatla & Enrico Pennings, 2014. "Defensive Disclosure of Patentable Inventions under Antitrust Enforcement," Industry and Innovation, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 21(7-8), pages 533-552, November.
    37. Baruffaldi, Stefano H. & Simeth, Markus, 2020. "Patents and knowledge diffusion: The effect of early disclosure," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 49(4).
    38. Fudenberg, Drew & Gilbert, Richard & Stiglitz, Joseph & Tirole, Jean, 1983. "Preemption, leapfrogging and competition in patent races," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 22(1), pages 3-31, June.
    39. Oliver Alexy & Joel West & Helge Klapper & Markus Reitzig, 2018. "Surrendering control to gain advantage: Reconciling openness and the resource‐based view of the firm," Strategic Management Journal, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 39(6), pages 1704-1727, June.
    40. Johnson, Justin P., 2014. "Defensive publishing by a leading firm," Information Economics and Policy, Elsevier, vol. 28(C), pages 15-27.
    41. Baker, Scott & Mezzetti, Claudio, 2005. "Disclosure as a Strategy in the Patent Race," Journal of Law and Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 48(1), pages 173-194, April.
    42. Ajay Bhaskarabhatla & Deepak Hegde, 2014. "An Organizational Perspective on Patenting and Open Innovation," Organization Science, INFORMS, vol. 25(6), pages 1744-1763, December.
    43. Rosemarie Ham Ziedonis, 2004. "Don't Fence Me In: Fragmented Markets for Technology and the Patent Acquisition Strategies of Firms," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 50(6), pages 804-820, June.
    44. Audretsch, David B & Stephan, Paula E, 1996. "Company-Scientist Locational Links: The Case of Biotechnology," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 86(3), pages 641-652, June.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    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. 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.
    2. Gans, Joshua S. & Murray, Fiona E. & Stern, Scott, 2017. "Contracting over the disclosure of scientific knowledge: Intellectual property and academic publication," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 46(4), pages 820-835.
    3. Gaessler, Fabian & Harhoff, Dietmar & Sorg, Stefan, 2019. "Bargaining Failure and Freedom to Operate: Re-evaluating the Effect of Patents on Cumulative Innovation," Rationality and Competition Discussion Paper Series 220, CRC TRR 190 Rationality and Competition.
    4. Rockett, Katharine, 2010. "Property Rights and Invention," 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 315-380, Elsevier.
    5. de Rassenfosse, Gaétan & Pellegrino, Gabriele & Raiteri, Emilio, 2024. "Do patents enable disclosure? Evidence from the invention secrecy act," International Journal of Industrial Organization, Elsevier, vol. 92(C).
    6. Hsu, David H. & Hsu, Po-Hsuan & Zhao, Qifeng, 2021. "Rich on paper? Chinese firms’ academic publications, patents, and market value," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 50(9).
    7. 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.
    8. Bernhard Ganglmair & Imke Reimers, 2019. "Visibility of Technology and Cumulative Innovation: Evidence from Trade Secrets Laws," CRC TR 224 Discussion Paper Series crctr224_2019_119v1, University of Bonn and University of Mannheim, Germany.
    9. Markus Simeth & Michele Cincera, 2016. "Corporate Science, Innovation, and Firm Value," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 62(7), pages 1970-1981, July.
    10. Robin Cowan & Nicolas Jonard & Ruth Samson, 2024. "Strategies of search and patenting under different IPR regimes," Working Papers of BETA 2024-20, Bureau d'Economie Théorique et Appliquée, UDS, Strasbourg.
    11. Simeth, Markus & Raffo, Julio D., 2013. "What makes companies pursue an Open Science strategy?," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 42(9), pages 1531-1543.
    12. Sheer, Lia, 2022. "Sitting on the Fence: Integrating the two worlds of scientific discovery and invention within the firm," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 51(7).
    13. repec:wip:wpaper:6 is not listed on IDEAS
    14. Ajay Bhaskarabhatla & Enrico Pennings, 2012. "Defensive Disclosure under Antitrust Enforcement," Tinbergen Institute Discussion Papers 12-010/2, Tinbergen Institute.
    15. Dosi, Giovanni & Palagi, Elisa & Roventini, Andrea & Russo, Emanuele, 2023. "Do patents really foster innovation in the pharmaceutical sector? Results from an evolutionary, agent-based model," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 212(C), pages 564-589.
    16. Giovanni Dosi & Luigi Marengo & Corrado Pasquali, 2010. "How Much Should Society Fuel the Greed of Innovators? On the Relations between Appropriability, Opportunities and Rates of Innovation," Chapters, in: Riccardo Viale & Henry Etzkowitz (ed.), The Capitalization of Knowledge, chapter 4, Edward Elgar Publishing.
    17. Schwiebacher, Franz, 2013. "Does fragmented or heterogeneous IP ownership stifle investments in innovation?," ZEW Discussion Papers 13-096, ZEW - Leibniz Centre for European Economic Research.
    18. Yin Li & Jan Youtie & Philip Shapira, 2015. "Why do technology firms publish scientific papers? The strategic use of science by small and midsize enterprises in nanotechnology," The Journal of Technology Transfer, Springer, vol. 40(6), pages 1016-1033, December.
    19. Gambardella, Alfonso, 2023. "Private and social functions of patents: Innovation, markets, and new firms," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 52(7).
    20. Yun Hou & I.P.L. Png & Xi Xiong, 2023. "When stronger patent law reduces patenting: Empirical evidence," Strategic Management Journal, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 44(4), pages 977-1012, April.
    21. Thomas Hellmann & Enrico Perotti, 2011. "The Circulation of Ideas in Firms and Markets," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 57(10), pages 1813-1826, October.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Invention pledge; Lead time advantage; Open disclosure; Follow-on innovation;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • O36 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Innovation; Research and Development; Technological Change; Intellectual Property Rights - - - Open Innovation
    • O32 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Innovation; Research and Development; Technological Change; Intellectual Property Rights - - - Management of Technological Innovation and R&D
    • O31 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Innovation; Research and Development; Technological Change; Intellectual Property Rights - - - Innovation and Invention: Processes and Incentives

    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:49:y:2024:i:4:d:10.1007_s10961-023-10050-w. 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.