Influences of intellectual property management and intermediary services on corporate licensing activities

Patented technological-knowledge exploitation by out-licensing is an important issue for strategic technology management. The systematic approach to technology licensing appears to be critical for the creation of new opportunities and the capture of value from a firm’s own technology assets. This study investigates what drives two modes of IP licensing activities: the ‘simultaneous own using and out-licensing’ and the ‘only out-licensing.’ This study empirically analyzes how the firms’ IP licensing activities are affected by IP-related managerial activities (e.g. IP planning and auditing), the type of IP organization, and the use of intermediary services, by using a firm-level data from the “2007 Intellectual Property-related Activities Survey in Korea.” Our findings show that firms conducting IP planning and auditing tend to license out more patents through simultaneously exploiting technologies internally and externally. In addition, this study finds that firms with the project-based IP organization tend to license more patents through the purely external technology exploitation. Finally, the collaboration with technology intermediary service providers enhances the simultaneous internal and external technology exploitation.