Value Creation Potential of Intellectual Capital in Biotechnology - Empirical Evidence from Finland

Abstract

The objective of the study was to empirically verify impacts of intellectual capital (IC) to the anticipated future sales of small- and medium-sized companies within the biotechnology industry. The study creates and develops tools for the valuation of companies by relating the existing intangibles and the expected value creation of the companies in that industry displaying high growth prospects but long and insecure product development phases. Theoretically, IC is divided into the following three categories: human capital (HC), structural capital (SC), and relational capital (RC). In the empirical setting, survey data of small- and medium-sized Finnish biotechnology companies are used. In the econometric analyses, the interactions, or empirical co-variation, between the three categories of IC explain two-thirds of the variance in the anticipated future sales of the sample companies. Thus, it seems that a well-balanced combination of HC, SC, and RC implies value creation potential and high anticipated future sales.