An Empirical Analysis of Make-or-Buy Decisions in Patenting

Recent research argues that the management of intangible assets is a key to firms’ long-term success and requires specialized management techniques and a distinctive set of skills (Rivette & Kline 2000, Standfield 2002, Granstrand 1999). It is further argued that the active management of firms’ intellectual capital is as a prerequisite for securing (future) profits making IP-departments an indispensable part of firms’ strategic planning efforts (Lev 2004, Reitzig 2004). Despite this widespread acknowledgement of the importance of intellectual property management as corporate function little attention has been paid to the actual organization of IP related services within firms. Among the few publications containing brief studies of the organization of IP-departments are Taylor & Silbertson (1973), Granstrand (1999) and Pitkethly (2001).