IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/ete/msiper/688662.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Technology Differentiation and Firm Performance

Author

Listed:
  • Samuel Arts
  • Bruno Cassiman
  • Jianan Hou

Abstract

Prior work has extensively studied how investing in R&D and building a technology portfolio relate to superior firm performance. However, the value of a firm’s technology portfolio should also be driven by the degree to which it is more unique and technologically differentiated from other firms. To study this research question, we develop a new method to characterize firm technology based on the semantic content of patent portfolios that allows us to map a firm’s competitive position in the technology space relative to all other firms and to measure the differentiation of a firm’s technology portfolio. Using a large panel of U.S. public firms from 1980 to 2015, we find that technology differentiation has a strong positive and long-lasting relation with firm performance. Moreover, differentiated firm technology is particularly valuable in industries with higher R&D intensity and with stronger product market competition. We provide open access to all code and data to measure the technology similarity and the technology differentiation of U.S. public firms.

Suggested Citation

  • Samuel Arts & Bruno Cassiman & Jianan Hou, 2022. "Technology Differentiation and Firm Performance," Working Papers of Department of Management, Strategy and Innovation, Leuven 688662, KU Leuven, Faculty of Economics and Business (FEB), Department of Management, Strategy and Innovation, Leuven.
    • Handle: RePEc:ete:msiper:688662
    Note: paper number MSI_2201
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://lirias.kuleuven.be/retrieve/649018
    File Function: Published version
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    More about this item

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    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:ete:msiper:688662. 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.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using 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: library EBIB (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://feb.kuleuven.be/MSI .

    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.