Files
Abstract
The Bayh-Dole Act of 1980, key court decisions, and several breakthrough process
technologies, paved the way for a period of remarkable growth in the patenting of life
science research by U.S. universities in the 1980s and 1990s. Using a multiple-output
cost framework and panel data on 96 universities over two decades this article examines
whether economies of scope and/or scale are present in university production of three
major life science research outputs: journal articles, patents, and doctorates. The results
show strong evidence of significant economies of scope between articles and patents and
economies of scale in article and patent production, suggesting that larger universities
have distinct cost advantages in the production of high quality research outputs.