nep-ino New Economics Papers
on Innovation
Issue of 2021‒09‒27
six papers chosen by
Uwe Cantner
University of Jena

  1. Multinationals, innovation and institutional context: IPR protection and distance effects By Bruno, Randolph L.; Crescenzi, Riccardo; Estrin, Saul; Petralia, Sergio
  2. Green technologies, complementarities, and policy By Nicolò Barbieri; Alberto Marzucchi; Ugo Rizzo
  3. Employment quality, economic performance and wages in Europe. Exploring the virtuous circle By Pianta, Mario; Reljic, Jelena
  4. Human Resources in Europe. Estimation, Clusterization, Machine Learning and Prediction By Leogrande, Angelo; Costantiello, Alberto
  5. The Rise of Scientific Research in Corporate America By Ashish Arora; Sharon Belenzon; Konstantin Kosenko; Jungkyu Suh; Yishay Yafeh
  6. The reassuring effect of firms' technological innovations on workers' job insecurity By Caselli, Mauro; Fracasso, Andrea; Marcolin, Arianna; Scicchitano, Sergio

  1. By: Bruno, Randolph L.; Crescenzi, Riccardo; Estrin, Saul; Petralia, Sergio
    Abstract: We characterise the knowledge production process whereby the inventive capabilities of the firm generate innovation output in highly inventive multinational enterprises (MNEs). We explore the sensitivity of this relationship to the strength of intellectual property rights (IPR) protection across the MNEs R&D subsidiaries. We argue that MNE innovative performance will be enhanced when the firm’s R&D activities are based in locations where IPR protection is stronger. Moreover, when considering the internal geography of the MNEs R&D activities, innovation performance depends on the distance between the home and host country IPR regime. Thus, innovation performance is worse as the difference between home and host IPR regimes increases. Finally, we explore asymmetries in this relationship, in particular that the deterioration is more marked when MNEs locate their R&D activities in host economies with IPR protection significantly less strict than in their home country. We test these ideas using a unique new dataset about the most innovative MNEs in the world, an unbalanced panel of around 900 MNEs observed for the period 2004 to 2013 and find strong support for all our hypotheses.
    Keywords: multinationals; innovation; IPR protection; institutional distance; patents; inventive capabilities; 639633-MASSIVE-ERC-2014-STG; 822781-GROWINPRO; Internal OA fund
    JEL: R14 J01 L81
    Date: 2021–07–19
    URL: https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ehl:lserod:110441&r=
  2. By: Nicolò Barbieri (Department of Economics and Management, University of Ferrara, Ferrara, Italy); Alberto Marzucchi (Gran Sasso Science Institute, Social Sciences, L’Aquila, Italy); Ugo Rizzo (Department of Mathematics and Computer Science, University of Ferrara, Ferrara, Italy)
    Abstract: The present study explores the technological complementarities between green and non-green inventions. First, we look at whether inventive activities in climate-friendly domains depend on patenting in related technological domains that are not green. Based on patent data filed over the 1978–2014 period, we estimate a spatial autoregressive model using co-occurrence matrices to capture technological interdependencies. Our first finding highlights that the development of green technologies strongly relies on advances in other green and in particular non-green technological domains, whose relevance for the green economy is usually neglected. Building on this insight, we detect the non-green complementary technologies that co-occur with green ones and assess whether environmental policies affect this particular instantiation of technologies at the country level. The results of the instrumental variable approach confirm that while environmental policies spur green patenting, they do not displace the development of the non-green technological pillars upon which green inventions develop.
    Keywords: Green technology, patent data, environmental policy, network-dependent innovation
    JEL: H23 O31 Q58 Q55
    Date: 2021–09
    URL: https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:srt:wpaper:1021&r=
  3. By: Pianta, Mario; Reljic, Jelena
    Abstract: This paper investigates the existence of a virtuous circle between industries’ employment quality, the ability to introduce new products, increase labour productivity and pay higher wages. We first present descriptive evidence of these trends in Europe. We then develop a simultaneous four-equation model investigating empirically four related variables: first, the rise of non-standard work as a proxy of low employment quality; second, the success of firms in translating their R&D efforts into new products and services; third, labour productivity growth driven by technological activities; fourth, wage increases and the factors supporting their rise. The model is tested empirically for 41 manufacturing and service sectors of six European economies (Germany, France, Italy, Spain, the Netherlands, and the UK) over the period 1996-2016. The findings provide novel evidence of mutually reinforcing relationships, where higher employment quality complements technological activities, leading to more product innovations that increase productivity growth. In turn, the latter allows wage increases that contribute to higher employment quality, resulting in a good jobs-high innovation virtuous circle.
    Keywords: Non-standard work, Product Innovation, Labour productivity, Wages, Virtuous circles, European industries
    JEL: J23 J24 J31 J50 L6 L8 O31 O33 O52
    Date: 2021–09–19
    URL: https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pra:mprapa:109797&r=
  4. By: Leogrande, Angelo; Costantiello, Alberto
    Abstract: We estimate the relationships between innovation and human resources in Europe using the European Innovation Scoreboard of the European Commission for 36 countries for the period 2010-2019. We perform Panel Data with Fixed Effects, Random Effects, Pooled OLS, Dynamic Panel and WLS. We found that Human resources is positively associated to “Basic-school entrepreneurial education and training”, “Employment MHT manufacturing KIS services”, “Employment share Manufacturing (SD)”, “Lifelong learning”, “New doctorate graduates”, “R&D expenditure business sector”, “R&D expenditure public sector”, “Tertiary education”. Our results also show that “Human Resources” is negatively associated to “Government procurement of advanced technology products”, “Medium and high-tech product exports”, “SMEs innovating in-house”, “Venture capital”. In adjunct we perform a clusterization with k-Means algorithm and we find the presence of three clusters. Clusterization shows the presence of Central and Northern European countries that has higher levels of Human Resources, while Southern and Eastern Europe has very low degree of Human Resources. Finally, we use seven machine learning algorithms to predict the value of Human Resources in Europe Countries using data in the period 2014-2021 and we show that the linear regression algorithm performs at the highest level.
    Keywords: Innovation and Invention: Processes and Incentives, Management of Technological Innovation and R&D, Technological Change: Choices and Consequences, Diffusion Processes Intellectual Property and Intellectual Capital, Open Innovation, Government Policy.
    JEL: O30 O31 O32 O33 O34 O38
    Date: 2021–09
    URL: https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pra:mprapa:109749&r=
  5. By: Ashish Arora; Sharon Belenzon; Konstantin Kosenko; Jungkyu Suh; Yishay Yafeh
    Abstract: Corporate science in America emerged in the interwar period, as some companies set up state-of-the-art corporate laboratories, hired trained scientists, and embarked upon basic research of the kind we would associate today with academic institutions. Using a newly assembled dataset on U.S. companies between 1926 and 1940 combining information on corporate ownership, organization, research and innovation, we attempt to explain the rise of corporate research. We argue that it was driven by companies trying to take advantage of opportunities for innovation made possible by scientific advances and an underdeveloped academic research system in the United States. Measuring field-specific scientific backwardness in several different ways, we find that large firms, business group affiliated firms, and firms close to the technological frontier were more likely to initiate scientific research. We also find that companies in monopolistic or concentrated industries were more likely to engage in basic research. Corporate research was positively correlated with novel and valuable patents, and with market-to-book ratios. For companies choosing to do so, investment in corporate research seems to have paid off. The results shed light on the link between corporate organization, market structure and corporate science.
    JEL: N8 N82 O32
    Date: 2021–09
    URL: https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:nbr:nberwo:29260&r=
  6. By: Caselli, Mauro; Fracasso, Andrea; Marcolin, Arianna; Scicchitano, Sergio
    Abstract: We analyse how the adoption of technological innovations correlates with workers' perceived levels of job insecurity, and what factors mediate such relationship, by exploiting a recent, large and dedicated survey distributed to a representative sam- ple of Italian workers. The dedicated survey allows us to look at both cognitive and affective job insecurity as well as different technological innovations actually adopted by the companies where the workers are employed. The results show that the adoption of technological innovations by companies is related to a reduction in the level of job insecurity perceived by their workers and suggest that technological innovation is perceived by active workers as a signal of firms' health and of their commitment to preserving the activity. We also find that the reassuring effect of technological innovations is differentiated across companies and workers, due to the mediating role played by a number of factors, such as specific training and signifi- cant changes in workers' usual activities.
    Keywords: job insecurity,technology,innovation,automation
    JEL: J28 O33
    Date: 2021
    URL: https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:zbw:glodps:938&r=

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