The process of external technology exploitation as part of technology marketing: a conceptual framework

Summary form only given. Enterprises with resource limitations have to deal with higher investments in R&D. The firms started to concentrate on what they do best. They focused their in house R&D expenditures on core technologies and sourced other less important technologies externally. But R&D expenditures still are rising. To exploit their technological capabilities in a given time as efficient as possible, firms try to get higher returns on investments. This means that technologies no longer only serve to empower their own products, but also serve as external market objects. Still a lot of enterprises are refusing to exploit their technological knowledge externally fearing losing their crown jewels or just are unconscious of this opportunity. We consider both interfaces of the technology market and the enterprise: external technology acquisition and external technology exploitation, assuming a considerable synergy potential between the acquisition and exploitation process.