The Paradox of Innovation Nondisclosure: Evidence from Licensing Contracts
研究美国上市公司在知识产权许可合同中如何权衡向投资者披露信息与对竞争对手保密，发现拥有高价值知识产权的公司更常选择不披露，且市场对此有正面反应。
Innovative firms must trade off disclosing to investors and maintaining secrecy from competitors. We study this trade-off in a sample of IP licenses mandatorily disclosed by US public firms, whose contents can be temporarily redacted. Hand classifying the redacted information, we find that firms with valuable IP in competitive markets redact IP information more often. Markets react positively to the redaction of IP information, consistent with theoretical predictions rationalizing a separating equilibrium in which nondisclosure signals more valuable IP. Our results suggest that credible nondisclosure partially resolves information frictions for innovative public firms when facilitated by sophisticated investors.