Research cooperation within the bio-pharmaceutical industry : Network analyses of co-publications within and between firms

Bio-pharmaceutical R&D is increasingly an international affair. Research articles published in the peer-reviewed international scientific and technical journals represent quantifiable research outputs of bio-pharmaceutical firms. Large-scale systemic measurements of worldwide trends and sectoral patterns within bio-pharmaceutical science can be gauged from these articles, where coauthored research papers are assumed to reflect research cooperation and associated knowledge flows and exchanges. We focus our attention on the largest science-based multinational enterprises (MNEs), those that produce relatively large quantities of research articles. The study deals with the worldwide output of research articles that are co-produced by corporate researchers during the years 1996–2001.