Technology Commercialization and the Performance of New Technology-Based Firms: The Moderating Effect of Internationalization

Technology commercialization is the ability of companies to translate technology into innovations that leads to valuable market transactions. Companies may enhance the ability to commercialize their technologies through knowledge acquisition from international activities. This means that internationalization itself could be a useful platform for new technology-based small firms to help facilitate technology commercialization activities. Nonetheless, research into technology commercialization as a key capability that allows firms to successfully bring their technologies to markets remains under- examined. This study seeks to explore the impact of technology commercialization on the performance of new technology-based small firms in Korea, with a particular focus on the moderating effect of internationalization. Building on the extant relevant literature, the study constructs hypotheses, which are tested using multiple regression analyses for data collected from 221 new technology-based firms which operate in the Korean Green IT sector. The results indicate that technology commercialization and internationalization positively relates to performance and that internationalization positively moderates the relationship between technology commercialization and performance. The findings imply that, for new technology-based firms, active involvement in international activities can help them to gain external complementary resources, thereby contributing to performance improvement. Such firms that seek to commercialize R&D output therefore need to strategically place more emphasis on international business involvement in that it should secure further growth and competitive advantage. Limitations and suggestions for future research are presented.