The Effect of Business Characteristics on the Methods of Knowledge Protections

Intellectual property (IP) protection has been suggested to be essential in protecting innovation in product-dominant companies. However, with the development of service industries, the ineffectiveness in IP protection becomes manifest. Meanwhile, other knowledge protecting methods enable companies to maintain their competency without formal protection. This study examines the effectiveness of different means of knowledge protection. Specifically, business is classified according to companies’ offering nature, serving mode and consider about their business hardware. The effectiveness of protection methods is analyzed among these business types. Interviews were conducted with senior managers of 39 companies in China and Singapore. It is demonstrated that the choice of knowledge protecting method does not depend mainly on whether a company provides products or services, but on how the company produces and provides its offerings. It is found that the core competency of companies largely affects their attitude on whether to protect their offerings. It is found that in weak appropriability regimes, companies apply for patents not for their knowledge protection function, but for other benefits, such as getting awards or tax reductions, and improving reputation among customers.

[1]  Jan Olhager,et al.  Linking product–process matrices for manufacturing and industrial service operations , 2006 .

[2]  A. Arundel.  The relative effectiveness of patents and secrecy for appropriation , 2001 .

[3]  S. Bartholomew.  National Systems of Biotechnology Innovation: Complex Interdependence in the Global System , 1997 .

[4]  Tim R.V. Davis,et al.  Different service firms, different core competencies , 1999 .

[5]  A. Leiponen,et al.  If you cannot block, you better run: Small firms, cooperative innovation, and appropriation strategies , 2009 .

[6]  Deepak Somaya,et al.  The Use of Patents, Copyrights and Trademarks in Software: Evidence from Litigation , 2004 .

[7]  Christopher A. Voss,et al.  Case research in operations management , 2002 .

[8]  Jacob Eskildsen,et al.  Sustainable Enterprise Excellence and the Continuously Relevant and Responsible Organization , 2013 .

[9]  T. R. Davis.  Different service firms, different international strategies , 2004 .

[10]  Albert H. Segars,et al.  Knowledge Management: An Organizational Capabilities Perspective , 2001, J. Manag. Inf. Syst..

[11]  Liang Guo.  PERSPECTIVE: An Analysis of 22 Years of Research in JPIM* , 2008 .

[12]  E. Nijssen,et al.  Exploring product and service innovation similarities and differences , 2006 .

[13]  P. Vermeulen,et al.  Organizing successful new service development: a literature review , 2003 .

[14]  U. Lichtenthaler.  RETRACTED: Determinants of proactive and reactive technology licensing: A contingency perspective , 2010 .

[15]  Y. Furukawa,et al.  Intellectual property rights and appropriability of innovation , 2009 .

[16]  Giorgio Sirilli,et al.  Technological innovation in services and manufacturing: results from Italian surveys , 1998 .

[17]  Wolfgang Sofka,et al.  Knowledge protection strategies of multinational firms--A cross-country comparison , 2010 .

[18]  D. Mowery,et al.  Strategic alliances and interfirm knowledge transfer , 1996 .

[19]  Stephen W. Brown,et al.  Service-Logic Innovations: How to Innovate Customers, Not Products , 2008 .

[20]  Juuso Toikka,et al.  Secrecy versus patenting , 2007 .

[21]  J. Jansen.  Strategic Information Revelation in an R&D Race with Spillovers , 2004 .

[22]  Lourens Broersma,et al.  Services innovation, performance and policy: A review, synthesis report in the framework of the project Structurele informatievoorziening in Diensten (SIID) (Structural Information Provision on Innovation in Services) , 2003 .

[23]  A. Parasuraman,et al.  Problems and Strategies in Services Marketing , 1985 .

[24]  Liisa-Maija Sainio,et al.  Appropriability Regime for Radical and Incremental Innovations , 2008 .

[25]  Nancy E. Landrum.  Unintended Consequences of Business with 4 Billion: Lessons Learned from First Generation BOP Strategies , 2012 .

[26]  Charles Wankel,et al.  Ethical Models and Applications of Globalization: Cultural, Socio-Political and Economic Perspectives , 2011 .

[27]  R. Cooper,et al.  New industrial financial services: What distinguishes the winners , 1991 .

[28]  G. Dosi,et al.  How much should society fuel the greed of innovators?: On the relations between appropriability, opportunities and rates of innovation , 2006 .

[29]  C. Lovelock,et al.  Whither Services Marketing? , 2004 .

[30]  Rocci Luppicini.  Ethical Impact of Technological Advancements and Applications in Society , 2012 .

[31]  Robert M. Grant,et al.  The knowledge-based view of the firm: Implications for management practice , 1997 .

[32]  A. Johne,et al.  New service development: a review of the literature and annotated bibliography , 1998 .

[33]  A. McGahan,et al.  Profiting from technological innovation by others: The effect of competitor patenting on firm value , 2006 .

[34]  A Critical Examination of the Assumptions, Beliefs and Ethical Considerations that Underlie Business Models of Global Poverty Reduction , 2012 .

[35]  Pär Åhlström,et al.  Problems of establishing service supply relationships: Evidence from a high-tech manufacturing company , 2006 .

[36]  L. Zucker,et al.  Present at the biotechnological revolution: transformation of technological identity for a large incumbent pharmaceutical firm , 1997 .

[37]  M. Fisher.  What is the Right Supply Chain for Your Product , 1997 .

[38]  Jos Jansen,et al.  Strategic Information Disclosure and Competition for an Imperfectly Protected Innovation , 2010 .

[39]  L. Berry,et al.  Creating new markets through service innovation , 2006 .

[40]  Faïz Gallouj,et al.  Patterns of innovation organisation in service firms: postal survey results and theoretical models , 2001 .

[41]  Wendy van der Valk,et al.  Service procurement in manufacturing companies: results of three embedded case studies , 2008 .

[42]  M. Bader.  Extending legal protection strategies to the service innovations area: Review and analysis , 2007 .

[43]  Oliver Gassmann,et al.  Enforcing Intellectual Property Rights in Weak Appropriability Regimes , 2010 .

[44]  Jan C. Aurich,et al.  Life cycle oriented design of technical Product-Service Systems , 2006 .

[45]  Knut Blind,et al.  Interrelation between patenting and standardisation strategies: empirical evidence and policy implications , 2004 .

[46]  Oksana Mont,et al.  Clarifying the Concept of Product-Service System , 2002 .

[47]  Heinz Hollenstein,et al.  Innovation modes in the Swiss service sector: a cluster analysis based on firm-level data , 2003 .

[48]  F. Castellacci.  Technological paradigms, regimes and trajectories: Manufacturing and service industries in a new taxonomy of sectoral patterns of innovation , 2008 .

[49]  Pia Hurmelinna-Laukkanen,et al.  Protection for profiting from collaborative service innovation , 2010 .

[50]  K. Artto,et al.  Services in project-based firms – Four types of business logic , 2009 .

[51]  M. Freel,et al.  Patterns of Technological Innovation in Knowledge‐Intensive Business Services , 2006 .

[52]  Jennifer W. Spencer,et al.  Firms' knowledge-sharing strategies in the global innovation system: empirical evidence from the flat panel display industry , 2003 .

[53]  D. Teece.  Profiting from technological innovation: Implications for integration, collaboration, licensing and public policy , 1993 .

[54]  Muammer Ozer,et al.  Do the best new product development practices of US companies matter in Hong Kong , 2006 .

[55]  Réjean Landry,et al.  Managing the protection of innovations in knowledge-intensive business services , 2008 .

[56]  Deli Yang,et al.  Patent Propensity in Small Technology-Based Firms: Evidence from Zhongguancun Science Park , 2010 .

[57]  M. Colombo,et al.  In search of complementary assets: The determinants of alliance formation of high-tech start-ups , 2006 .

[58]  R. Evered,et al.  Alternative Perspectives in the Organizational Sciences: “Inquiry from the Inside” and “Inquiry from the Outside” , 1981 .

[59]  Hamid Noori.  The transition from low-valued repetitive manufacturing sites to technology hubs: The influence of globally operating companies , 1998 .

[60]  B. Edvardsson,et al.  Service portraits in service research: a critical review , 2005 .

[61]  Zining Guo,et al.  A paradigmatic and methodological examination of knowledge management research: 2000 to 2004 , 2008, Decis. Support Syst..

[62]  Ian Barclay,et al.  New Product Development From Past Research to Future Applications , 1998 .