We investigate how a deferred patent examination system promotes ex-ante screening of patent applications, which reduces both the number of granted patents and the use of economic resources for examinations, without reducing the return from R&D. Based on a real option theory, we develop a model...

The number of requests for patent examination showed a significant increase of 83% from 1997 to 2007 in Japan, while the number of patent applications increased by only 1%. This paper aims at theoretically and empirically analyzing the causes of recent "explosion" of examination requests,...

This paper examines what drives author ordering in scientific research. We first discussa theoretical framework for the choice between alphabetical ordering and relative-contribution-based ordering and develop hypotheses, focusing on the nature of research, in particular, the importance of...

A significant part of the patents held by a firm are not used. We show that, given the uncertainty of invention quality at the patent application stage and the sunk cost incurred for obtaining and developing a patent, the patent (internal) utilization rate declines with the (anticipated) size of...

We examine why cooperation among essential patent holders for a standard may not occur, despite significant gains for patent holders and users of the standard. Utilizing Maskin's (2003) framework, we show that a grand coalition can be implemented only if the number of patent holders (n) is...

We examine empirically how patent quality in terms of forward citation and science linkage affect the market value of a firm. We find that both indicators affect the market value of a firm significantly even if we extensively control the effects of the other major determinants of the market...