Tian Chan

Paper featured in HBR.

We challenge the notion that collaboration is always better than working alone. In our study using technological and design patents we find that the decomposability of the invention significantly moderates the effectiveness of the lone inventor. Particularly, tasks that are less decomposable relatively advantages the lone inventor. We also show... [Read More]

We show using both archival data and experiments that teams with at least one female member may create more valuable inventions than all-male teams when the focal invention structure is integral. In collaboration with Steffen Keck, Haibo Liu, and Wenjie Tang.

Leveraging on the decision of State Street vs. CLS Bank whereby business method patents are now patentable subject matter, we examine returns to firms that applied or were granted business method innovation patents the US manufacturing, trade and distribution sectors from 1999-2014. We find evidence that both business method innovation... [Read More]

A new design can be compared with its contemporaries or older designs. In this study, we argue that the temporal distance between the new design and its comparison play an important role in understanding how a new design’s similarity with other designs contributes to its market valuation. Specifically, we argue... [Read More]

Using data from a major medical body scanner manufacturer, we show that free-rider problems impose a heavy cost in the maintenance of medical body scanners, and that pay per service maintenance plans can improve performance and reduce costs. Check out the paper. With Francis de Véricourt and Omar Besbes

We show how one can identify styles (categories of product design that are perceived to be similar) using design patents. Using this data set we show that (i) style turbulence (unpredictable changes in style) is increasing over time, and (ii) technological turbulence (unpredictable changes in technology) have a U-shaped relationship... [Read More]