NSF Award
9307159
9307159 Fleming To be competitive in today's environment of technological change and global competition, firms need to develop and follow sagacious technology strategies. In order to make important decisions regarding which particular technology strategies would be optimal to follow, a firm needs reliable information to answer questions such as: how quickly and efficiently can its R&D department develop and build on new technological innovations in its industry relative to its competitors, and how effective is the firm at appropriating the benefits of its R&D efforts and withholding those benefits from others? Results of the Phase I Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) study establish the technical basis for using patent citation data as a valuable tool for helping firms evaluate their own technological capabilities and those of their competitors. The objectives of the Phase II research focus on (1) demonstrating the feasibility of constructing a patent citation database that meets technology managers' analytical needs easily and cost-effectively; (2) extending the citation model developed in Phase I to the point where it can function as a reliable tool for (a) correcting citation data for censoring and (b) predicting future citation levels; and (3) using these prototype tools to examine the validity of hypothesized relationships between citation patterns and the technology strategies of companies. The project aims to provide analytical tools for developing and assessing corporate technology strategies, including patent citation databases and user-friendly search and analytical software, consulting services, and publications. The project addresses the need to understand the interrelationships among patent citations, the technology strategies of companies, and their economic performance. The project will use this knowledge as the basis for its contribution to the future of US economic competitiveness, that is, to make available analytical tools useful for formulating and analyzing corporate technology policies that will be valuable to companies and investors. ***
