Patent Citations - An Analysis of Quality Differences and Citing Practices in Hybrid Corn
52 Pages Posted: 18 Jul 2011 Last revised: 14 Mar 2016
There are 3 versions of this paper
Patent Citations - An Analysis of Quality Differences and Citing Practices in Hybrid Corn
Patent Citations - An Analysis of Quality Differences and Citing Practices in Hybrid Corn
Patent Citations and the Size of the Inventive Step - Evidence from Hybrid Corn
Date Written: March 5, 2016
Abstract
A growing empirical literature uses patent citations as a quality-adjusted measure for innovation, despite concerns about the validity of this measure. This paper links patents with objective measures of improvements in the quality of patented inventions – measured through performance in field trials for hybrid corn – to examine three potential factors that influence citations: 1) improvements in performance 2) citing practices of patent attorneys, and 3) citing practices of patent examiners. This analysis reveals that citations are robustly correlated with performance, which confirms that citations are a useful quality-adjusted measure for innovation. The citing practices of patent attorneys and examiners, however, also influence citations. Patent attorneys cite early patents, which help establish the patentability of an invention; this practice may inflate citation counts for early patents, particularly for inventions that have only recently become patentable. Attorneys also add self-citations; our analysis indicates that that self-citations can be an indicator of follow-on invention. By comparison, examiner-added citations are typically unrelated to improvements in performance or follow-on invention.
Keywords: innovation, patents, intellectual property, hybrid corn
JEL Classification: O30, O31, O33, O34, L70, Q10
Suggested Citation: Suggested Citation
Register to save articles to
your library
Recommended Papers
-
Patents and Innovation: Evidence from Economic History
By Petra Moser
-
Dead Poets’ Property - How Does Copyright Influence Price?
By Xing Li, Megan Macgarvie, ...
-
Prizes, Publicity, and Patents: Non-Monetary Awards as a Mechanism to Encourage Innovation
By Petra Moser and Tom Nicholas
-
Patent Pools, Competition, and Innovation - Evidence from 20 U.S. Industries under the New Deal
By Ryan Lampe and Petra Moser
-
Technological Innovation, Resource Allocation and Growth
By Leonid Kogan, Dimitris Papanikolaou, ...
-
The Direct Costs from NPE Disputes
By James E. Bessen and Michael J. Meurer
-
An Economic Interpretation of FRAND
By Dennis W. Carlton and Allan Shampine
-
Anticompetitive Effects of Common Ownership
By José Azar, Martin C. Schmalz, ...
-
Compulsory Licensing and Innovation - Historical Evidence from German Patents after WWI
By Joerg Baten, Nicola Bianchi, ...
-
Copyrights and Creativity: Evidence from Italian Operas
By Michela Giorcelli and Petra Moser