1 Who Invents ? : Evidence from the Japan - US Inventor Survey

Human resources are increasingly seen as a key to innovation competitiveness, and there is a need for detailed, systematic data on the demographics of inventors, their motivations, and their careers. To gain systematic data on who invents, we collected detailed information on a sample of inventors in the US and Japan (the RIETI-Georgia Tech inventor survey). The data come from a unique set of matched surveys of US and Japanese inventors of triadic patents, i.e., patents from patent families with granted patents in the US and applications filed in Japan and in the EPO, with data from over 1900 responses from the US and over 3600 responses from Japan. Based on these survey data, we compare the profiles, motivations, mobility and performance of inventors in the US and Japan. Overall, we find some important similarities between inventors in the US and Japan. The distribution across functional affiliations within the firm, by gender, by educational fields and their motivations, are all quite similar. In particular, in both countries we find inventors emphasizing task motivations over pecuniary motivations. Firm-centered motivation (e.g., generating value for my firm) is also an important reason