  The present paper extends the literature investigating key drivers leading
certain patents to exert a stronger influence on the subsequent technological
developments (inventions) than other ones. We investigated six key
determinants, as (i) the use of scientific knowledge, (ii) the breadth of the
technological base, (iii) the existence of collaboration in patent development,
(iv) the number of claims, (v) the scope, and (vi) the novelty, and how the
effect of these determinants varies when patent influence - as measured by the
number of forward citations the patent received - is distinguished as within
and across the industrial and organizational boundaries. We conducted an
empirical analysis on a sample of 5671 patents granted to 293 US biotechnology
firms from 1976 to 2003. Results reveal that the contribution of the
determinants to patent influence differs across the domains that are identified
by the industrial and organizational boundaries. Findings, for example, show
that the use of scientific knowledge negatively affects patent influence
outside the biotechnology industry, while it positively contributes to make a
patent more relevant for the assignee's subsequent technological developments.
In addition, the broader the scope of a patent the higher the number of
citations the patent receives from subsequent non-biotechnology patents. This
relationship is inverted-U shaped when considering the influence of a patent on
inventions granted to other organizations than the patent's assignee. Finally,
the novelty of a patent is inverted-U related with the influence the patent
exerts on the subsequent inventions granted across the industrial and
organizational boundaries.
