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Cloutier, L. Martin; Castle, David --- "Introduction" [2009] ELECD 487; in Castle, David (ed), "The Role of Intellectual Property Rights in Biotechnology Innovation" (Edward Elgar Publishing, 2009)

Book Title: The Role of Intellectual Property Rights in Biotechnology Innovation

Editor(s): Castle, David

Publisher: Edward Elgar Publishing

ISBN (hard cover): 9781847209801

Section Title: Introduction

Author(s): Cloutier, L. Martin; Castle, David

Number of pages: 4

Extract:

Introduction
L. Martin Cloutier and David Castle

The contribution of innovation to a firm, region or state's competitiveness
provides a strong incentive to understand how to stimulate creative activ-
ity, to create and capture value, and strategically to protect investments
made in an innovation system. Economic performance, often measured as
per capita gross domestic product (pcGDP), is the most common measure
that is used to compare a sector's contribution to an economy, changes to
an economy over time, or state-to-state comparisons. Although pcGDP
is faulted for being an unreliable measure, it prevails because it is one
of the few simple measures available. It is valued for being a somewhat
comprehensive endpoint measure, in the sense that innovative, value-
creating activity has to happen before an impact on pcGDP is appreciable.
Firms and governments, often feeling the sting of late-stage performance
appraisals, seek measures of innovation further upstream in value chains
to give them tools actively to manage innovation.
The quest to measure innovation to manage it better generates problems
for firms and governments. As many economies around the world make the
transition from a production base to a service base, one of the hallmarks
of knowledge-based economies, they encounter the challenge of evaluating
the assets of firms. The market value of real estate and equipment held by
firms dedicated to manufacturing was once enough; now the knowledge
base of the firm is its chief asset. Measuring intangibles, an activity that
almost seems like an ...