American Economic Review Vol. 98 No. 4 2008

Restructuring Research: Communication Costs and the Democratization of University Innovation

Ajay Agrawal¹; Avi Goldfarb²

¹ Rotman School of Management, University of Toronto, 105 St. George St., Toronto, Canada, M5S 3E6, and NBER. · ² Rotman School of Management, University of Toronto, 105 St. George St., Toronto, Canada, M5S 3E6.

Abstract

We report evidence that Bitnet adoption facilitated increased research collaboration between US universities. However, not all institutions benefited equally. Using panel data from seven top engineering journals, Bitnet connection records, and institution ranking data, we find that middle-tier universities were the primary beneficiaries; they benefited largely by increasing their collaboration with top-tier schools. Furthermore, we find that the magnitude of this effect is greatest for co-located pairs. Thus, the advent of Bitnet – and likely of subsequent networks – seems to have increased the role of middle-tier universities as producers of new knowledge in the national innovation system.

DOI

10.1257/aer.98.4.1578

Volume

98

Issue

4

Pages

1578-1590

Language

en

Sources

openalex bibtex:phds-export.bib crossref

Cite

APA 7 MLA 9 Chicago (author–date) Harvard Elsevier Harvard (JFE, JBF…) The Accounting Review Academy of Management American Marketing Association INFORMS (Management Science) Copy citation Copied ✓