Green Patenting and Voluntary Innovation Disclosure

We investigate whether the sustainability implications of firms’ innovative pursuits are associated with their voluntary disclosure choices. Specifically, we predict green innovators will voluntarily provide innovation disclosure to reduce stakeholders’ costs of processing patent details and enjoy the social capital benefits associated with their green investments. Consistent with our expectations, we observe that green patenting firms provide more innovation disclosure in conference calls relative to their industry peers, controlling for patent value, the determinants of green innovation, and other firm characteristics. We also show the result holds when we restrict our green patenting measures to include only patents important to the firm’s overall innovative portfolio. Results further indicate that green innovators provide more innovation disclosure when firms are most likely to benefit from improved social capital and when patent processing costs are high. Moreover, green patenting firms that provide innovation disclosure enjoy increases in environmental-ESG ratings and stronger investor response to their conference calls, consistent with voluntary innovation disclosure reducing processing costs for information intermediaries and investors. Our findings highlight sustainability-specific social capital benefits as a motivating force for voluntary innovation disclosure and suggest the nature of a firm’s underlying innovations can impact its information environment.