Head-to-head competition hurts profitability, and firms can benefit from avoiding it. Our model argues that strict transparency requirements help public firms soften competition and studies how that affects innovation aimed at displacing rivals. We show that intermediately attractive innovation...

We compare innovation strategies of public and private firms based on a large sample over the period 1997-2008. We find that public firms' patents rely more on existing knowledge, are more exploitative, and are less likely in new technology classes, while private firms' patents are broader in...

We investigate the influence of government grants, venture capital (VC), and private equity (PE) funding on innovation in newly public firms. We examine innovation inputs (R&D), innovation outputs (patents), and the quality thereof (patent citations). We contribute to understanding of the...

This study investigates why newly listed firms become M&A targets shortly after their initial public offering (IPOs) from the perspective of product innovation. We find strong empirical evidence that IPOs with less established trademarks increase the likelihood of becoming IPO targets. We also...

Using USPTO patent application data, I apply a machine-learning algorithm to analyze how the current patent examination process in the U.S. can be improved in terms of granting higher quality patents. I make use of the quasi-random assignment of patent applications to examiners to show that...