| Peter Klein |
I’m not an Apple guy. I have no doubt the Mac is a fine product but, come on, I’m not some froofy artist type! (Teppo, take note.) And I know how to use a right mouse button. I do like the iPhone, and would definitely consider buying one if it weren’t tethered to AT&T. At present, however, the only Jobs et al. product I’ve owned is an Apple II back in high school. (With 48K and dual floppies, it sizzled!)
This week I’m teaching the Apple 2006 HBS case in my undergraduate strategy course. As the case materials emphasize, Apple’s product design and packaging capabilities are an important source of its competitive advantage. The Zen thing is certainly a refreshing change from the industry norm. In preparing the case I was reminded of a funny item that circulated a couple of years ago, What if Microsoft Designed the iPod Package? You don’t have to be one of the bad Kleins to enjoy it.
1 April 2008
| Peter Klein |
LBOs do not reduce patent activity, and the quality of patents may actually increase following a “going-private” transaction, according to a new paper by Morten Sorensen, Per Strömberg, and Josh Lerner.
A long-standing controversy is whether LBOs relieve managers from short-term pressures of dispersed shareholders, or whether LBO funds themselves are driven by short-term profit motives and sacrifice long-term growth to boost short-term performance. We investigate 495 transactions with a focus on one form of long-term activities, namely investments in innovation as measured by patenting activity. We find no evidence that LBOs decrease these activities. Relying on standard measures of patent quality, we find that patents applied for by firms in private equity transactions are more cited (a proxy for economic importance), show no significant shifts in the fundamental nature of the research, and are more concentrated in the most important and prominent areas of companies’ innovative portfolios.
I very much like this kind of work even though I’m a patent skeptic (1, 2, 3, 4).
20 March 2008
