Jungkyu Suh of New York University was a recipient of the 2025 Early Career Research Grant program. Learn more about their work:
What is your research question/topic?
We ask when and how firms choose to disclose internal scientific research. Specifically, we examine how corporate research projects transition between secrecy, scientific publication, and patenting, and how these disclosure decisions respond to advances in university science and competitive pressure from rival firms. Using archival data from RCA Laboratories, we study disclosure as a dynamic process rather than a one-time choice.
What are you hoping to accomplish through your research?
We aim to open the “black box” of corporate research by observing both disclosed and undisclosed projects inside a major industrial laboratory. We digitize over three decades of archival research records to publications, patents, organizational data, and researcher careers to identify the mechanisms that shape firms’ disclosure strategies. The project will also produce a publicly available dataset that enables future research on corporate science, secrecy, and innovation.
What impact could this research have more broadly on the field of strategic management?
What impact could this research have more broadly on the field of strategic management?
Studying research disclosure is inherently difficult because undisclosed research is unobservable to us by design. This project overcomes that fundamental limitation by using internal archival records that allow us to observe both disclosed and undisclosed corporate research. As a result, the study provides rare, direct evidence on secrecy, selective disclosure, and the strategic trade-offs firms face between publishing, patenting, and remaining private. Our findings promise to inform classic questions in strategic management on corporate science, knowledge appropriation, and the role of external scientific and competitive environments in shaping firm behavior.
What SMS resources (members, workshops, events, etc.) were helpful to you during the application process?
Current senior members active in the SMS community provided invaluable feedback and support as we readied the application for submission. Our heartfelt thanks goes to all that chipped in their time and expertise to sharpen the proposal.
Who inspires you the most to do this work? (whether that is professionally or personally).
Paul David, David Hounshell, Steve Klepper, Nathan Rosenberg and many others inspired us take a leap of faith to invest long hours in the archives of RCA Labs. We stand on the shoulders of these giants who used primary historical evidence to better our understanding of corporate strategy.