Today's #sosdci publication comes from Debasis Mitra and Qiong Wang:
Management of intellectual asset production in industrial laboratories
IISE Transactions
Abstract
Industrial laboratories generate profit for their parent companies and in so doing benefit
society through spillovers of novel technologies and solutions. However, research's
share of corporate investment in R&D has been declining. To understand this trend from
the operations perspective, we develop a model-based analysis of the management of
intellectual asset production in industrial laboratories. The model consists of a linear
network with multiple stages in which the first stage is the research division engaged in
generating novel concepts and prototypes. It is followed by multiple development stages
that transform research outputs into intellectual assets and marketable products.
Management is responsible for strategic budget allocation to the stages, and tactical
management of individual projects. Decisions are based on intrinsic return on investment
in the laboratory, and option values of projects, both of which are endogenously
determined. Our model and analyses have revealed several possible pathways that can lead
to the management of the laboratories to reduce the share of research spending in their
budgets, namely: (i) lower variability of project values; (ii) improved investment
efficiency at development stages; and (iii) higher revenue realization from assets
produced at early development stages.
Cassidy R. Sugimoto
Professor of Informatics
School of Informatics, Computing, and Engineering
Indiana University Bloomington
http://ella.slis.indiana.edu/~sugimoto/index.php