Intellectual property reassembly: a novel approach to evaluate R&D collaboration outcomes

Research and development (R&D) collaboration outcomes have usually been evaluated based on the magnitude of outputs, such as new products, patenting, or productivity growth. However, they have yet to be evaluated based on the various directions of mutual learning between collaborators, which have a long-term impact on the post-partnership technology development of the collaborators. This study proposes a framework that evaluates intellectual property (IP) reassembly, which indicates how a focal firm produces new IP based on its learnings from its R&D partnership, as a novel approach to evaluate R&D collaboration. The proposed approach estimates the degree to which IP reassembly (a focal firm's independent patent applications drawing on co-patents) occurs in the following directions: exploitation of, exploration beyond, or complementary to the pre-partnership capabilities of each collaborator. Within the framework, a focal firm's performance can be compared to that of its partner. The proposed framework is illustrated and validated using the case of partnership between Samsung SDI and BOSCH (2008–2012) in their battery development. We discuss implications for contract design, partnership boundaries, and performance evaluation in the context of R&D collaboration.