学术视界｜专利对外许可行为有助于企业自身创新能力发展吗?（附原文PDF下载）

冯萍数字经济与商业模式 2023-03-28

专利对外许可行为有助于企业自身创新能力发展吗?

冯萍

(长沙理工大学经济与管理学院，湖南长沙410114)

摘要：本文使用2008—2017年中国制造业上市企业专利许可数据，采用倾向值得分匹配倍差法考察了企业专利技术对外许可行为与自身创新能力发展的关系。研究发现：总体而言，中国制造业上市企业专利技术对外许可行为存在显著的自选择效应，创新能力越强的企业选择对外许可其专利使用权的可能性越大；控制自选择效应后，企业专利对外许可行为对自身创新能力的发展有长期促进作用。对不同技术类型企业研究发现，高、低技术产业企业的专利许可行为对其自身创新能力提升分别有长、短期促进作用，中技术产业企业的许可行为对企业创新能力发展则无显著影响。

关键词：专利对外许可；创新能力；倾向值得分匹配；倍差法

主要研究结论：本文以2008—2017年中国制造业上市企业为研究对象，采用倾向值得分匹配多期倍差法对企业专利技术对外许可决策与自身创新能力之间双向因果关系进行检验，得到以下结论：

（1）中国制造业上市企业对外许可行为的自选择效应显著，创新能力越强的企业选择对外许可其专利使用权的可能性越大。自选择效应的存在表明专利许可和创新能力间的内生性问题不可忽视，不考虑这种内生性会高估许可行为的真实作用。（2）控制自选择效应后，企业专利对外许可行为对自身创新能力有显著的长期提升作用。企业的专利对外许可行为可以强化企业知识产权保护意识、发展自身专利许可管理能力，有助于企业提升自身创新能力、保持自身技术的长期领先优势。（3）对不同技术类型企业研究发现，中技术产业企业的许可决策对企业创新能力发展无显著影响，低技术产业企业的许可行为对其创新能力的发展存在短期的提升作用，高技术产业企业的许可行为对其创新能力的提升则有长期的促进作用，且相较于中、低技术产业企业，这种促进作用最大。究其原因，高技术产业具有专利密集性特点，业内企业的知识产权保护意识强，专利许可的管理能力强。在技术更新换代速度越来越快的当下，为了应对竞争压力，高技术企业间还会构建专利池，与竞争对手交叉许可各自专利技术，形成技术联盟以最快利用最新技术，从而能产生更多、更新的专利技术。

Can patents out-licensing improve firms′ innovation performances?

Feng Ping

(School of Economics and Management, Changsha University of Science and Technology, Changsha 410114, Hunan, China)

Abstract:Patent licensing transactions have a significant impact on the development of firms′ innovation activities. From the perspective of the licensee, the technology-licensing transaction can help production firms to lower the technical threshold, directly enter the production or assembly of the industry. It can also help R&D firms to reduce innovation costs and risks, keep up with the technological frontiers in the professional field and accelerate technology learning. From the perspective of the licensor, enterprises can obtain corresponding income by renting proprietary technology, internalizing the external part of the innovation behavior. Licensors can also develop their licensing management capabilities and knowledge digestion and absorption capabilities through licensing transactions.

Based on the role of technology catch-up, the existing empirical research on patent licensing transactions of Chinese enterprises focuses on the impact of patent licensing-in behaviors on the innovation ability of firms. Paper to explore the impact of licensing-out behavior on firms′ innovation ability is rare. Existing related researches mainly focus on developed countries, and most of them neglect the impact of the companies′ innovation capabilities on their patent licensing decisions. The more companies holding patents, the stronger their innovation ability, and the greater the possibility of licensing their patents. Enterprise patent licensing behavior has an obvious self-selection effect, which means that there is a strong endogenous relationship between enterprise patent out-licensing and its innovation capability. Ignoring this potential endogeneity may overestimate the true effect of patent licensing.

By applying the Propensity Score Matching difference-in-difference method on the patent out-licensing data of Chinese manufacturing listed companies in 2008-2017, this paper examines the two-way causal relationship between the patent out-licensing behavior of Chinese firms and the development of their innovation ability and makes the following findings. (1) The self-selection effect of the licensing-out behavior of listed companies in China′s manufacturing industry is significant. Firms with higher innovation ability are more likely to license out their patents. The existence of the self-selection effect indicates that the endogenous problem between patent out-licensing and innovation capability cannot be ignored, and neglecting the endogeneity will overestimate the true role of patent out-licensing behavior. (2) After controlling for the self-selection effect, firms′ patent licensing-out behavior has a significant long-term improvement effect on their innovation capability. Firms′ patent licensing-out behavior can strengthen the awareness of intellectual property protection and develop their patent licensing management capabilities, which helps enterprises to enhance their innovative capabilities and maintain their long-term leading edge in technology. (3) Further research on different technology types of enterprises finds that the effects of patents out-licensing vary with technological regimes. Patent out-licensing behavior can improve the innovative performance of high-tech and low-tech industry enterprises in the long term and short term respectively. But for the middle-tech industry enterprises, the effects are insignificant.

The findings of the study give us the following enlightenment: First, as an effective way to improve the learning ability of technology, the patent technology licensing among enterprises not only helps the licensee enterprises to achieve innovation through the technology licensing-in but also helps the licensor enterprises to enhance their independent innovation ability and maintain long-term technology leading edge. Therefore, according to their own development needs, enterprises can out-license their own patented technologies to other enterprises to maintain their long-term leading edge in technology. Technology-related enterprises can eliminate patent licensing barriers by building patent pools, reduce patent licensing transaction costs, promote the application of patented technologies, and achieve win-win cooperation. Second, information dissemination activities are conducive to the improvement of enterprise innovation capabilities. When the Chinese government gives policy guidance to encourage enterprises′ technological innovation and R&D activities, it also needs to pay sufficient attention to the middle and back ends of R&D activities. The government should actively plan and introduce policies conducive to the development of the patent technology market, build an information exchange platform for potential technology transaction parties, reduce information asymmetry, encourage the development of third-party technology transaction services, actively guide the construction of patent pools, and accelerate proprietary technology transactions. The government can learn from the "patent box" system of developed countries in Europe and America, give appropriate tax incentives to the transfer of patent technology licenses, encourage more Chinese companies to voluntarily spread their proprietary information and achieve a win-win situation for both parties.

Key words:patent out-licensing; innovation performance; propensity score matching; difference-in-difference

引用本文：冯萍.专利对外许可行为有助于企业自身创新能力发展吗?[J].科研管理,2021,42(8):184-191.

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