Coopetition, Cooperation and Competition as Determinants of Companies’ Appropriation Strategies

52 Pages Posted: 13 Sep 2012 Last revised: 21 Feb 2013

See all articles by Knut Blind

Knut Blind

Technische Universität Berlin (TU Berlin)

Bernd Ebersberger

Management Center Innsbruck (MCI)

Annika Lorenz

Utrecht University - Copernicus Institute of Sustainable Development

Date Written: February 2013

Abstract

In this article, we investigate how a company’s coopetition (collaboration with competitors), cooperation and competition strategies influence its usage of formal and informal intellectual property (IP) appropriation mechanisms. In addition to firm characteristics and sector variables as predictors for appropriation methods used in previous studies, we disentangle coopetition, cooperation and competition as further determinants for a firm’s use of these instruments. Until now, research has not investigated the effects a company’s cooperation with its competitors has on the tendency to use formal (legally protected IP rights e.g., patents, trademarks, etc.) or informal (e.g., secrecy, lead time) appropriation mechanisms. This leads to substantial model uncertainty, which we tackle by using Bayesian Model Averaging (BMA). We analyze firm level innovation survey data including the coopetition orientation of 1,879 German companies. We find that coopetition, cooperation breadth, price and technology competition associate with informal appropriation strategies, while in contrast, cooperation depth and a competitive strategy relying on design associate with the use of formal appropriation mechanisms. Thus, we contribute to existing research by providing first exploratory results of coopetition, cooperation and corporate strategies as determinants for a firm’s implementation of specific appropriation mechanisms. Our findings have implications for management and research. We find that companies should strive for IP appropriation strategies that are well aligned with their choice of cooperation and competition strategies as this facilitates value capturing from innovation.

Keywords: Bayesian Model Averaging, Coopetition, Cooperation, Competition, Intellectual Property Rights

JEL Classification: L14, L21, O32, O34, C11

Suggested Citation

Blind, Knut and Ebersberger, Bernd and Lorenz, Annika, Coopetition, Cooperation and Competition as Determinants of Companies’ Appropriation Strategies (February 2013). Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=2145165 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.2145165

Knut Blind

Technische Universität Berlin (TU Berlin) ( email )

Straße des 17
Berlin
Germany

Bernd Ebersberger

Management Center Innsbruck (MCI) ( email )

Universitaetsstr. 15
Innsbruck, 6020
Austria

Annika Lorenz (Contact Author)

Utrecht University - Copernicus Institute of Sustainable Development ( email )

Heidelberglann 2
3508 TC Utrecht
Netherlands

HOME PAGE: http://https://www.uu.nl/staff/ALorenz

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