The Effect of Intellectual Property on the Market Value of Firms : Evidence of R&D, Patent, Trademark and Design from Swedish Firms

• Main Authors: Ekman, Anton, Huila, Anton
• Format: Others
• Language: English
• Published: Uppsala universitet, Företagsekonomiska institutionen 2018
• Subjects: intellectual property; market value; Tobin’s q; R&D; patents; trademarks; designs; Economics and Business; Ekonomi och näringsliv
• Online Access: http://urn.kb.se/resolve?urn=urn:nbn:se:uu:diva-354764

We investigate the impact of intellectual property on the market value of firms. We use European and national research and development, patent, trademark, design, and financial data on Swedish public companies in the years 2003 to 2013. We regressed intellectual property indicators against Tobin’s q, which we use to measure the market value of firms. Patents, research and development, and trademarks indicate a positive relationship with a firm’s market value, while we did not observe the same relationship for designs. The use of intellectual property is concentrated in manufacturing industries. Large companies hold a majority of all intellectual property stocks. The results of the study show that in general, the financial markets tend to reward companies, which invest in intellectual property. In practice, our results implicate that intellectual property strategy affects shareholder value. Regarding research, our results mostly confirm findings from other studies on the market value of firms; research and development, patents and trademarks. However, more research is needed on the effect of design and the market value of firms.