• Journal of Technology Innovation
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• v.23 no.4
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• pp.123-149
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• 2015

Even though papers and patents generated by public research institutions including universities are continuously increasing in Korea, commercialization of research outputs is significantly lower than developed countries. Therefore, it is very important to improve the effectiveness of technology licensing offices(TLOs) of universities. In this study, we study effects of the patent manager dispatch program(PMDP) of the Korean Patent Office(KPO) on the performance of TLOs. KPO has dispatched patent experts to selected TLOs under the PMSD since 2006. Based on data of 126 TLOs, we analysed whether the PMSD has improved the performances of beneficiary TLOs. We tested two related hypotheses: (1)Whether or not a TLO received the dispatch service had effects on its performance? (2)Were early beneficiaries more effective than late beneficiaries or non-beneficiaries because of cumulative learning effects? The main findings are as follows. The past experience in itself did not improve performances of beneficiary TLOs. However, early beneficiaries were better than late beneficiaries or non-beneficiaries, that is, some learning effects might help the beneficiary TLOs improve their performances.