Are ivory towers truly ivory? Knowledge spillovers and firm innovation

Using a sample from 1980 to 2009, we find that firms headquartered near a knowledge center, as defined by 196 leading American research universities experience higher market-to-book ratios and higher stock volatility. The overall evidence is consistent with knowledge spillovers fostering firm innovation and growth in an increasingly knowledge-based economy and bringing good volatility and higher market valuation to the firm. Surprisingly, this effect comes only marginally through firm R&D and further investigation into other possible channels for the documented links is required. Robustness checks include controls for metropolis effects and utility patents filed. (C) 2015 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.