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This study aims to examine the impacts of inward international licensing (IIL) on the absorptive capacity (ACAP) of small and medium enterprises (SMEs) in a developing economy.

The study is explorative, qualitative and elaborative in nature. Therefore, a multiple case study was selected and performed as the research strategy. The data were collected from four pharmaceutical SMEs licensed from European pharmaceutical large-scale enterprises.

The results confirm that IIL has a strong effect on acquisition, assimilation, transformation and exploitation as absorptive factors. Furthermore, the results have been enhanced by several contextual factors of ACAP human resources, inter-and intra-firm relationships, internal knowledge and managerial and strategic aspects. These contextual factors have also been influenced by IIL.

From the licensee perspective in a developing context, examining the extant literature on non-equity strategic alliances shows that very few studies have empirically examined the impact of this kind of alliance, such as IIL, on SMEs’ ACAP. On this basis, the study provides evidence that non-equity strategic alliances, particularly IIL, enhance SMEs’ capabilities such as ACAP. In other words, to overcome SMEs’ resource limitations and inadequate capabilities, IIL provides opportunities for them to obtain capabilities and critical resources.

For many small firms, buying technology through licensing has long been regarded as a major route to successful new product development. However, little research aimed at comparing the attitudes of small firms towards buying technology through licensing has been conducted. Using both univariate and multivariate analysis, this article reports an empirical study comparing the characteristics and perceptions of 81 Australian licensee and 107 nonlicensee small firms towards buying technology from international nonaffliated firms. Surprisingly, small nonlicensee firms are found to scan international technology developments more than their licensee counterparts. In addition, whereas nonlicensee firms have higher perceptions of the costs of technology licensing than licensees, paradoxically they also appear to have higher perceived benefits than licensees. Based of this inconsistency between attitude and behavior four types of firms are proposed — active/satisfied licensees, passive/dissatisfied licensees, potential licensees and nonlicensee firms. Theoretical and managerial implications of the results are discussed.

This paper aims to empirically examine the factors driving the acquisition of patents and foreign technologies in 2,198 firms spanning multiple industries in Visegrád countries.

To fulfil the research objectives, the authors used the binary logistic regression models for the empirical specifications to analyse the various hypotheses to ascertain the factors contributing to patents, foreign technologies and international quality certificate acquisitions in Visegrád countries.

The results show that technological innovations, in-house and external research and development, intense competition from the informal sector and external knowledge search positively influence firms to acquire patents, foreign technologies and international quality certificates. The study further showed that certain firm characteristics, such as size, having a board of directors, female top managers and top managers’ experience, positively influenced firms’ ability to obtain patents, foreign technologies and international quality certificates.

The authors provide new insights into understanding the factors contributing to international technological linkages in the context of transitional countries such as the Visegrád four group. The authors have shown that international technology linkages through foreign technology licences and international quality certifications are vital for innovations in transition economies.

Investigates the relative effects of organizational and managerial factors on the firm′s propensity to acquire new technology through licensing from foreign non‐affiliated companies. Aims to contribute to the literature on the role of international licensing in the firm′s technology strategy by examining both licensee and non‐licensee firms. Finds that the two sets of factors make different but complementary contributions to the firm′s propensity to licence‐in foreign technology, with the managerial factors having far greater impact than the organizational factors. In addition, the individual factors have significantly different effects on the propensity to adopt licensing by licensee and non‐licensee firms in the sample. The results suggest that international licensors who look at both sets of factors in screening and selecting prospective licensees are more likely to be successful than those who look at one set of factors alone.

The purpose of this study is to advance and test the idea that product exports and technology imports are complementary cross-border learning approaches for emerging market firms’ innovation performance. In addition, this paper also seeks to search for contextual variables that affect this complementarity.

This study takes systems approach to examine complementarity, combining a “productivity” and an “adoption” approach. In addition, interaction approach is also used as robustness check.

The authors show that the positive effect of export activity on firms’ growth rate is higher for firms that also engage in technology import, and vice versa. Furthermore, they show that, Ceteris paribus, firms’ adoption of one cross-border learning mechanism (e.g. entering export markets) positively influences the adoption of the other (e.g. technology import). Moreover, this complementarity is only significant for firms from province with low level of marketization.

This inconsistency about learning-by-exporting and technology import on innovation can be resolved, at least partially, by the complementarities perspective. This paper also reveals two mechanisms of learning-by-exporting: the indirect effect of export on innovation through increasing the likelihood of adoption decision of importing technology and enhancing the positive effect of technology imports.

The potential of combining the two strategies should not be ignored by managers. To improve regional competitiveness, local governments should try best to improve the efficiency of customs to help firms realize the synergistic effect of learning-by- exporting and learning-by-technology-importing.

This study first explores the positive complementarity between the two cross-border learning mechanism in sharping EEEs 2019 innovation performance and identifies the condition to realize the synergistic effect of learning-by-exporting and learning-by-technology-importing.

The International Marketing of Technology: An Interaction Perspective More and more companies have resorted to a wide diversity of international operation forms in order to enter and develop foreign markets. This diversity has been one of the features of international marketing over the past decade. Even though it appears that the entry mode to internationalization is still via simple exporting, with perhaps a shift to foreign investment later on, alternative modes, with various patterns of sequential development have become stronger features of international business operations (Luostarinen, 1979). The variety has, as yet, not been adequately reflected in official statistics of trade, investment and service flows between countries.

Firms have typically tried to profit from their technical innovations by selling them indirectly, embedded in goods and services. Markets for technology, in which innovations are sold or licensed, have been much rarer. Yet, trade in technology has grown systematically over the past 20 years, as reflected in the growth of arrangements such as licensing agreements, R&D joint ventures, and contract R&D. Recent estimates indicate that royalties received by American corporations for industrial processes may amount to about a quarter of total U.S. R&D. A number of supporting institutions that facilitate effective dissemination of information, standardization, and contracting are vital to the rise and functioning of markets for technology. Intellectual property rights, and in particular patents, are one such institution. The main objectives of this survey are to review critically the literature on the relationship between trade in technology and patent protection, and to assess the contribution of stricter and better-defined patent protection to the emergence of technology markets. We start our survey by providing a tentative taxonomy of markets for technology and some recent evidence on their extent and evolution. We then explore several reasons why firms would be willing to act as suppliers in the market for technology. The core of the survey revolves around the idea that patents facilitate the development of markets for technology in several ways: They enhance the ability of the licensor to extract rents from its innovation; they reduce costs in technology trade by forcing an increased codification of knowledge; they reduce information asymmetries, opportunistic behaviors, and transaction costs. However, the literature also points to some potential costs of stronger patents, including litigation costs and the problem of “anti-commons.” Finally, we explore the implications of patents and markets for technology for entry, competition and industry dynamics.

This paper aims to study the validity of potential factors that might affect US information and communication technology (ICT) holders' choice of foreign licensing partners.

This study focuses on ICT industry. The sample firms for this study are drawn from the SDC by Thomson Financial and this sample was used to construct a data in which a unit of observation is the unique US licensor – foreign licensee pair, or a dyad. The hypotheses are tested using the random-effects logit model.

The important explanatory factors relate to the knowledge appropriability and the level of economics freedom of a licensee's country, and familiarity between partners through prior licensing agreements. Market similarity between partners, however, appears to be an insignificant factor.

The findings suggest that transaction cost, competition, and national absorb capacity considerations weigh in heavily in explaining firms' choice of foreign licensing partners.

The paper makes an important contribution to licensing literature as the understanding of what drives partner choice is still sparse. Especially, the paper makes a uniqueness of dealing with international technology licensing.

This chapter proposes a survey of the main results produced by the literature on licensing and some original insights, with a particular focus on globalization, North–South models of technology transfer, the issue of how the intellectual property rights influences international licensing, and asymmetric information.

The purpose of this paper is to explore the instrumental role that copyright and trademark enforcement strength plays in stimulating licensing flows in 21 countries.

In so doing, panel data methodology serves as the empirical platform upon which the investigation between the trademark and copyright enforcement strength levels of 21 countries and the choice between unaffiliated and affiliated licensing of US firms for the period 1998-2011 is conducted.

The evidence suggests that both copyright and trademark enforcement strength have a highly significant effect on licensing and, more specifically, that stronger levels of enforcement stimulate higher levels of unaffiliated licensing.

The authors use the two longitudinal indices of copyright and trademark enforcement strength which capture the effectiveness and efficiency with which copyrights and trademarks are enforced in 21 countries.