Frank leads the Innovation and Intellectual Property Management (IIPM) Laboratory, which is part of the Centre for Technology Management. The IIPM Lab takes an engineering management (firm level) perspective and a problem focused research approach on IP for distributed, collaborative and cumulative innovation processes and systems with a particular focus on emerging and sustainability technologies as well as climate change innovation. 

Research

Frank pursues research at the intersection of engineering/technology, management sciences and business (micro) economics. He has keen interests in particularly in sustainability, but also in entrepreneurship. His work is published widely in leading international journals, such as, Research Policy, Nature Biotechnology, International Journal of Production Economics, Journal of Business Research, IEEE Transactions on Engineering Management, Technovation, Technology Forecasting and Social Change, Creativity and Innovation Management, World Patent Information, R&D Management, Plos One and others mainly with focus on two themes:

1. Innovation and Intellectual property management (IIP): Technology transactions (acquisition, exploitation/commercialisation), open IP strategies, patent pledges, patent informatics, market intermediaries and licensing as well as novel technologies for the future of IP management, such as machine and deep learning, distributed ledgers / smart contracts.
   
   
2. Innovation processes of product service systems (PSS) with a focus on ownership (club and public goods) and sharing / shared use with an emphasis on sustainability.

Amongst others, his research has been funded by the EU, UK research councils, such as the EPSRC and ESRC, the UK's Global Challenge Research Funds, Research England, the British Council, the R&D Management Association (RADMA), the Cambridge DAAD Hub, the Cambridge Centre for Research in the Arts, Social Sciences and Humanities, the EU Horizon programme, Vinnova - Sweden’s governmental innovation agency, the Newton Trust, the Leverhulme Trust, the Hans Sauer Stiftung, and Awapatent Stiftelsen. 

Frank has worked with governmental agencies, the European Commission, patent offices as well as companies across different industries and countries.

His former PhD students include Leonidas Aristodemou (now working with the OECD in Paris), Aocheng Tang based in Shanghai, Cihat Cengiz working as a VC, Jonas Ehrnsperger currently working as data scientist with the Mercedes-Benz Group AG, as well as Mingjin Guo and Tianyi Wang both based in China. 

Teaching

Frank teaches technology, innovation and IP management courses to graduate and undergraduate students, but also executives via IfM ENGAGE. He has established an elective module on "Innovation and Strategic management of Intellectual Property" (4E1) offered to Cambridge engineering and MPhil students, is course director for MET 2B, module leader for the MET "Technology and Innovation Management" course and responsible for MET 2B industrial projects. He is Director of Studies for Manufacturing Engineering students at Wolfson College and external MET DoS at Gonville and Caius College. 

PhD opportunities

If you are interested in pursuing PhD studies in the field of strategic IP or innovation/ technology management please feel free to contact me. We prefer candidates with experience either from closely related innovation studies and with industrial experience closely related to the subjects. Please further ensure that you fit the University's PhD in Engineering requirements, about which information can be found here.

Memberships 

• 1^st Workshop on Blockchain theoRy and ApplicatIoNs - BRAIN 2020 in conjunction with ISCC 2020 - Technical Committee
• EURAM Conference Annual Track on "Innovation for Sustainability, Circularity and Green-tech" - Co-founder and co-chair
• R&D Management Conference Annual Track on "Intellectual Property Management" - Co-Chair
• UK Engineering Professors' Council
• Institute for Electrical and Electronice Engineers (IEEE) (-2023)
• Society for Management in Kiel (GfB) 
• Cambridge Big Data - Strategic Research Initiative

Frank is governing body fellow at Wolfson College and a steering group member of Cambridge Global Challenges. He served as President of the EPIP (European Policy for Intellectual Property) association from 2022-2023. He is Affiliate to the Cambridge Centre for Intellectual Property and Information Law (CIPIL) and member of the Innovation and IP research group at Chalmers University of Technology, Sweden. He serves on the IP Commercialisation Committee of CIPA, the UK's Chartered Institute for Patent Attorneys.

He is editoral board member of World Patent Information, the leading journal in the field of Industrial Property information and documentation (IP informatics) and editorial review board member of LES Nouvelles, the journal of the Licensing Executive Society. He is editor in chief for the CTM working paper series. Frank was Departmental Editor at IEEE Transactions on Engineering Management for Technology Assessment, Forecasting, Planning and Transfer, IP Management and Licensing until 2023. 

Bio

Before joining Cambridge in 2014, Frank was Assistant Professor (Habilitand) at the Institute for Innovation Research at Kiel University (CAU), Germany's oldest research centre dedicated to innovation management, where he also provided lectures to the Kiel School of Sustainability. Prior to that he was postdoctoral researcher and PhD student at the Institute for Technology Management, led by Cornelius Herstatt at Hamburg University of Technology (TUHH). In 2008, Frank co-founded the venture backed start-up ARKTIK GmbH, a pioneering and award-winning climate care company for compensating CO2 mobility emissions, where he was member of the executive management board until end of 2009. Prior to his PhD studies he worked as research assistant with Ove Granstrand at Chalmers University of Technology. 

Frank holds a Master of Arts (MA) degree from the Univeristy of Cambridge, a Doctoral degree  in economics and social sciences (Dr rer pol) from Hamburg University of Technology (Germany) for his thesis titled "Technology Market Transactions: Auctions, Intermediaries and Innovation", later published by Edward Elgar. He obtained a Master of Science (MSc) degree with distinction from Chalmers University of Technology (Sweden) from the international Management of Production programme. Frank also holds a German Diplom degree (Dipl-Ing oec) from the industrial engineering and management programme at that time run jointly by TUHH, the University of Hamburg and Hamburg University of Applied Sciences.

Selected publications (more available here or at ResearchGate) or see the list at ORCID.            

• Vimalnath, P., Tietze, F., Jain, A., Gurtoo, A., Eppinger, E., & Elsen, M. (2022). Intellectual property strategies for green innovations - An analysis of the European Inventor Awards. Journal of Cleaner Production, 377.
• Moerchel, A., Tietze, F., Aristodemou, L., & Vimalnath, P. (2022). A Novel Method for Visually Mapping Intellectual Property Risks and Uncertainties in Evolving Innovation Ecosystems: A Design Science Research Approach for the COVID-19 Pandemic. IEEE Transactions on Engineering Management, 1-13. 
• Blümel, J. H., Tietze, F., & Phaal, R. (2022). Formulating IP strategies for service-intense business models: A roadmapping-based approach. World Patent Information, 70. 
• Eppinger, E., A. Jain, P. Vimalnath, A. Gurtoo, F. Tietze and R. Hernandez Chea (2021). Sustainability transitions in manufacturing: the role of intellectual property. Current Opinion in Environmental Sustainability 49: 118-126.
• Weyrauch, T., C. Herstatt and F. Tietze (2021). The Objective-Conflict-Resolution (OCR) Approach: A Novel Approach for Developing Radical and Frugal Innovation. IEEE Transactions on Engineering Management 68(3): 699-712.
• Contreras, J. L., M. Eisen, A. Ganz, M. Lemley, J. Molloy, D. M. Peters and F. Tietze (2020). Pledging Intellectual Property for COVID-19. Nature Biotechnology 38(10): 1146-1149.
• Aristodemou, L., Tietze, F., & Shaw, M. (2020). Stage Gate Decision making: a scoping review of Technology Strategic Selection Criteria for Early Stage Projects. IEEE Engineering Management Review, 48(2), 118-135. 
  Tietze, F., Vimalnath, P., Aristodemou, L., & Molloy, J. (2020). Crisis-Critical Intellectual Property: Findings from the COVID-19 Pandemic. IEEE Transactions on Engineering Management.
• Gretsch, O., F. Tietze and A. Kock (2020). Firms' intellectual property ownership aggressiveness in university–industry collaboration projects: Choosing the right governance mode. Creativity and innovation management.
• Ehrnsperger, J. F. and F. Tietze (2019). Patent pledges, open IP, or patent pools? Developing taxonomies in the thicket of terminologies. Plos One 14(8): e0221411.
• Tietze, F. and O. Granstrand (2019). Enabling the digital economy - distributed ledger technologies for automating IP licensing payments. Managing Innovation in a Global and Digital World - Meeting Societal Challenges and Enhancing Competitiveness. R. Tiwari and S. Buse, Springer Gabler.
• Foege, J. N., G. D. Lauritzen, F. Tietze and T. O. Salge (2019). Reconceptualizing the paradox of openness: How solvers navigate sharing-protecting tensions in crowdsourcing. Research Policy 48(6): 1323-1339.
• Lütjen, H., C. Schultz, F. Tietze and F. Urmetzer (2019). Managing ecosystems for service innovation: A dynamic capability view. Journal of Business Research 104: 506-519.
• Aristodemou, L. and F. Tietze (2018). Citations as a measure of technological impact: A review of forward citation-based measures. World Patent Information 53: 39-44.
• Aristodemou, L. and F. Tietze (2018). The state-of-the-art on Intellectual Property Analytics (IPA): A literature review on artificial intelligence, machine learning and deep learning methods for analysing intellectual property (IP) data. World Patent Information (Special issue on "Advanced Analytics of Intellectual Property Information for TechMining").