Inventor mobility in the pharmaceutical industry, 2001-2012

Newly released patent application data by the US Patent Office allows this paper to analyze inventor movement using a more accurate proxy than previously available. Previous literature has focused on mobility effects in the United States, this paper aims to fill a gap by concentrating on some European mobility questions, using the changed economic circumstances caused by the financial downturn after 2008 to create a before and after scenario. Geographical and firm data from applicants with multiple patent applications is exploited to estimate three models, namely mobility of inventors across countries, cities and firms. The models are used to estimate the effect of being European, being Southern European, being English-speaking, being a big European firm and being a big European city on mobility of inventors. This paper finds mixed support for its hypotheses that European or Southern European nations see a larger downturn in mobility than other nations after the financial downturn and that city size has an influence on mobility. No effect of firm size is found. This paper also finds that English speaking nations attract less inventors than other nations and that there was a global downturn of inventor mobility after the financial crisis.