RESEARCH-AND-DEVELOPMENT PRODUCTIVITY - A GLOBAL MULTIINDUSTRY COMPARISON

This study considers the productivity of R&D expenditures on an intern ational and multi-industry basis. Using 1992 data reported by Business Week on 117 companies in the United States, Europe, and Japan, we exa mined two measures of innovative output, patents and impact-adjusted p atents, in relationship to R&D spending. Our results clearly show a de creasing returns to scale of R&D expenditure. Although this pattern ho lds true regardless of industry or global region, the level of return and rate of decreasing returns vary by both industry and international region. (C) 1996 Elsevier Science Inc.