Quantity or quality? Knowledge alliances and their effects on patenting

This study examines a sample of R&D-active manufacturing firms over the period 2000–2009 and shows that knowledge alliances have a positive effect on patenting in terms of both quantity and quality. More interestingly, we distinguish between alliances that aim at joint creation of new knowledge and alliances that seek knowledge exchange. The results suggest that firms engaged in creation alliances subsequently file more valuable patents as measured by the number of forward citations. On the other hand, knowledge exchange alliances are associated with patent quantity, but not quality.