Academic patenting in Europe: recent research and new perspectives Francesco Lissoni DIMI-University of Brescia & KITES-Bocconi University, Milan APE-INV/TTFactor_IFOM-IEO/EPI workshop “Intellectual Property and Fundamental Research” at Bocconi University, Milan – June 9, 2011

Outline 1. What is academic patenting? Why are we interested? 2. Academic Patenting in Europe 1: A methodological novelty 3. Academic Patenting in Europe 2: Key findings (quantity and ownership) 4. Academic Patenting in Europe 3: Who are the academic inventors? 5. Questions for future research

What is academic patenting? Academic patent = Patent signed by (at least one) academic scientist  University may/may not own the patent: - business companies - public research organizations & funding agencies likely owners - individual scientists  Key indicator for: - technology transfer activity - university-industry ties (collaboration, consultancy) - academic entrepreneurship - markets for technologies

What is academic patenting? (cont.) University-invented vs. university-owned… …it reflects institutional peculiarities of European countries: - professor’s privilege (Germany, Austria, Scandinavia…) - universities’ lack of managerial autonomy / expertise - high status (lack of control) of academic profession … it has been the key for a recent & successful research programme Verspagen B. (2006), “University Research, Intellectual Property Rights and European Innovation Systems”, J. of Econ. Surveys 20/4: Lissoni F., P.Llerena, M.McKelvey, B.Sanditov (2008), “Academic Patenting in Europe: New Evidence from the KEINS Database”, Research Evaluation 16:

APE1: Methodological novelty TWO-STEP procedure: 1. Reclassification of patents by inventor 2. Name+matching between inventors and academic scientists  Key issue: standardization of names & quality check Raffo J., Lhuillery S. (2009), “How to play the “Names Game”: Patent retrieval comparing different heuristics”, Research Policy 38(10), pp. 1617‐1627 NAME GAME WORKSHOP (2009): http:// Additional STEP: 3. Survey work (homonimity & employment check; ad hoc questions)  Collect matched professors-inventors’ s  Submit matched patents and ask: 1. Confirmation of inventorship 2. Confirmation of academic status at the time of invention

1. Scientists in European universities produce many patents… … Relative to all domestic patents … Especially in science-based technologies 2. Most academic patents in Europe are owned by companies 3. Relative importance of other owners (universities, PROs, individuals..) depends upon: - role of PROs vs universities in the national science system - existence/abolition of the professor’s privilege - degree of autonomy of universities - technology (more university-ownership in life sciences) APE2: Key findings (quantity & ownership)

Academic inventors in Denmark, France, Italy, the Netherlands, Sweden, and the UK; nr. and % over nr. of professors, 2005 (2008) 1 Data from checked professor-inventor matches (professors confirmed to be the inventors) 2 All positively checked and unchecked records (records for which professors denied being the inventors are excluded)

Technological distribution of academic patents,

Ownership of academic patents, various countries,

APPLICANTSPATsMAIN CLASS ABB151Equipment and electrical machines Ericsson114Telecommunications Pharmacia UpJohn75Pharmacology and cosmetics AstraZeneca40Pharmacology and cosmetics Telia27Information Technologies Siemens25Medical technologies Karolinska19Biotechnologies A & Science Invest17Pharmacology and cosmetics Sandvik16Materials, Metallurgy Kvaerner Pulping13Materials treatment Top ten owners of academic patents in Sweden,

APPLICANTSPATsMAIN CLASS CNRS220Biotech., Medical technology INSERM99Biotech., Organic Chemistry Total72Macromolecular Chemistry, Thermal Processes France Telecom55Telecommunications Cea52Surface treatments, Materials, Metallurgy Thales45Analysis, measure and control technologies, Telecommunications Rhodia40Macromolecular Chemistry, Materials, Metallurgy Universite Paris VI42Biotechnologies Adir & Co.38Organic Chemistry Institut Pasteur38Biotech., Organic Chemistry Top ten owners of academic patents in France,

APPLICANTSPATsMAIN CLASS ST-Microelectronicss143Semiconductors CNR111Chemistry, Materials ENI97Chemistry, Materials Sigma-Tau67Chemistry, Materials Ausimont51Chemistry, Materials Telecom Italia Gruppo33Telecommunications MIUR26Chemistry, Materials Fidia Gruppo21Pharmacology, Biotechnologies ARS Holding19Pharmacology, Biotechnologies Optical Technologies19Equipment & electrical machines Top ten owners of academic patents in Italy,

Top ten owners of academic patents - Netherlands, APPLICANTSPATsMAIN CLASS Philips236Electronics Unilever98Pharmacology - Biotechnologies Leiden University73Pharmacology - Biotechnologies Utrecht University43Pharmacology - Biotechnologies AKZO43Instrumentation and Pharmacology Biotechnologies Delft University42Process Engineering University of Groningen32Pharmacology - Biotechnologies Stichting voor de technische wetenschappen (STW) 31Instrumentation and Pharmacology Biotechnologies Leadd (Leiden univ.)23Pharmacology - Biotechnologies University of Amsterdam22Pharmacology - Biotechnologies

Top ten owners of academic patents in Denmark,

UK

Share of Academic patents on the country total in 5 European countries, ; by techn. and country

Policies pushing university to OWN more patents Abolition of the professor’s priviledge  in Denmark: “swap” of individual- vs university-owned patents Bayh-Dole-Act-Like legislation  Innovation Act in France: increase university-company co- ownership Lissoni F., P.Lotz, J. Schovsbo, A. Treccani (2009) “Academic Patenting and the Professor’s Privilege: Evidence on Denmark from the KEINS database”, Science and Public Policy 36/8: Della Malva A., Lissoni F., Llerena P. (2010) “Institutional Change and Academic Patenting: French Universities and the Innovation Act of 1999”, KITES Working Paper 29, Univ. Bocconi, Milano

Pause for thought: where do we go from here? Economics of science & tech. transfer: -who are the academic inventors (incentives, careers…)? -how good (or bad) is patenting for science? Economics of IPRs: how valuable are academic patents?  for their applicants  for their licensees (how many)?  for society at large (quality, nr …)

APE 3: Who are academic inventors? 1. Academic inventors’ standing in the scientific community: - Are they marginal or prominent scientists? - Is their inventive activity complementary, alternative, or unrelated to their scientific research?  academic inventors as scientists 2. How do they relate to other inventors outside the academy, and to other scientists within it?  academics in the network of inventors

APE 3.1: Academic inventors’ standing in the scientific community  Academic inventors are highly productive scientists (fixed effect)  Scientific production is a good predictor of patenting activity (it is scientific results that get patented)  Patenting activity feeds back positively on scientific production (BUT endogeneity problems)  Gender bias

Mean publication rates per year, academic inventors vs controls; (Italy) * Dark (light) grey areas: inventor-control distribution difference 95 (.90) significant; Kolmogorov-Smirnov test ** Obs. range from 148 in 1975 to 299 in 2000 (284 in 2003) source: elaborations on EP-INV-DOC database and ISI Science Citation Index

APE 3.2: Academics in the network of inventors: highly productive, mobile, and central Academic inventors are “mobile”, aka “multi-applicant” inventors Academic inventors hold higher-than-average central positions in networks of inventors Central academic inventors act as “brokers” and “gatekeepers” between other academics and industrial researchers  central inventors are top scientists / senior figures  many ties (esp. with industrial researchers are maintained not for scientific collaboration, but info exchanges)  Key figures for knowledge diffusion?  Research on APE blends with research on inventors’ mobility and knowledge spillovers [same need of patent data at inventors’ level]

TECHNOLOGYNB CENT C CENT D CENT Electrical engineering. ElectronicsAll inv Academic InstrumentsAll inv Academic Chemicals. MaterialsAll inv Academic Pharmaceuticals. BiotechnologyAll inv Academic Position of academic inventors in the main component (France) B CENT = Avg betweenness centrality of inventors considered C CENT = Avg closeness centrality of inventors considered D CENT = Avg degree centrality of inventors considered

Ego-networks of Italian academic inventors: top brokers

Evidence from patent citations:  ‘Importance’, ‘Basicness’ and ‘Generality’ of US university-owned patents  Mixed evidence for Europe: Bacchiocchi & Montobbio (2009): no citation premium for university-owned patents Czarnitzky et al (2008); citation premium to academic patents in Germany Lissoni, Montobbio, Seri (2010): ownership matters! APE 3.1: The values of academic patents

Ownership and citation pattern of academic patents (Lissoni, Montobbio, Seri, 2010) Data: – 115,185 patents from Denmark, France, Italy, Netherlands, Sweden (years: ), of which: 5,019 academic patents (3,418: Company-owned) – 184,566 forward citations and 293,254 backward citations from (and to) EPO patents from 1978 to 2001 (source: Patstat). We control for self-citations

Methodology Survival analysis: event is the citation, duration is the citation lag: n. of days between the citing and cited priority date OLS, Poisson, Zero Inflated Poisson, Negative Binomial on the number of four-year forward citations give very similar results Explanatory variables Academic patent dummy or Academic*Ownership dummy (Company, University, Individual, or Government ownrship) Countries and technologies (dummies) Control variables: Co-patenting, Int’l Co-patenting, Foreign co- inventorship, Nr of Claims

Econometric results: estimated coefficients (1)(2)(3)(4) Academic inventor-0.04* (0.02) (0.02) - Company-owned-0.01 (0.02) (0.03) Individually Owned (0.07) -0.20** (0.06) University Owned--0.33*** (0.07) *** (0.07) Government and PROs--0.14** (0.05) * (0.05) Control VariablesNNYY n= ; robust standard errors

DKFRITNLSE Company- owned 0.02 (0.09) 0.06 (0.03) 0.10* (0.04) 0.16* (0.08) -0.21*** (0.04) Individually Owned 0.35* (0.16) 0.31* (0.14) 0.21 (0.11) 0.50* (0.11) 0.36** (0.12) University Owned (0.27) -0.40*** (0.12) -0.40** (0.15) (0.11) 0.06 (0.16) Governmen t and PROs (0.42) -0.13* (0.06) (0.15) (0.12) 0.09 (0.56) Control Variables YYYYY n.obs Country-specific models

 Academic patents owned by universities have lower impact than company-owned in a number of countries Does this result legitimate the ‘company-owned’ model? Or is it just the result of cherry-picking by companies? Do recent policies, that push universities to take more patents, make any sense?

Back to data: What do we need to go further? Economics of science & tech. transfer:  what is the origin of academic patents (type of funding / research)?  more research on networks and mobility: affiliations and careers Economics of IPRs: how valuable are academic patents?  Better econometrics  More measures (surveys)…  claims, divisionals…

A big project on inventors: ESF-APE-INV, ) creation of a European database on inventors  studies on mobility/networks 2) identification of “academic inventors” (university staff who are inventors)  studies on technology transfer and networks  2 workshops per year  Access to data for all those who contribute  Short/Long mobility grants  Partners (by now): KITES-Bocconi, ULB, KU Leuven, EPFL, Goteborg Univ., Beta-Strasbourg, Ludwig-Maximilian Univ., CBS, CSIC and many others... Basically everybody is welcome!!! Visit: