Commercializing patented inventions is a common goal of innovation policy, as it drives company revenues and regional economic growth. However, tracking the commercialization of inventions stemming from R&D is challenging. While programs like the Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) program are explicitly designed to encourage commercialization, most evaluation tools rely on approaches that may be anecdotal or incomplete, such as surveys, case studies, or patent counts.
Commercializing patented inventions is a common goal of innovation policy, as it drives company revenues and regional economic growth. However, tracking the commercialization of inventions stemming from R&D is challenging. While programs like the Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) program are explicitly designed to encourage commercialization, most evaluation tools rely on approaches that may be anecdotal or incomplete, such as surveys, case studies, or patent counts. A working paper by Carlo Bottai, Gaétan de Rassenfosse, and Emilio Raiteri proposes a new web-based methodology for detecting commercialization, offering a potentially more objective, real-time way to gauge the return on public innovation investments. It might prove a useful tool for state TBED programs that support R&D grants, research centers, and university-industry research collaboration.
