About

James Gerard Conley is an Operations Clinical Professor of Operations at the Kellogg School of Management and serves as a faculty member in the Operations Group and the Kellogg Center for Research in Technology & Innovation. He is an inventor and also serves as a Faculty Fellow at the Northwestern University Segal Design Institute. His academic research investigates the strategic use of intangible assets and intellectual properties to build and sustain competitive advantage. His research has been sponsored by organizations such as the World Intellectual Property Organization, Microsoft, the US Department of the Treasury IRS, the National Science Foundation, NASA, FAA, NIST, the Department of Defense, Motorola, and others. Conley's publications have received recognition through 'Best Paper' commendations from various professional societies, and his scholarship has been featured in mainstream outlets including the Wall Street Journal, Sloan Management Review, and California Management Review. Beyond Northwestern, he serves as an expert and author for the UN-based World Intellectual Property Organization and has been involved in policy and legal forums, including serving on the United States Department of Commerce Trademark Public Advisory Committee and offering testimony on intellectual property matters. He also serves on the boards of several companies and organizations related to intellectual property and innovation. Conley teaches courses on Intellectual Capital Management, Intellectual Property for Entrepreneurs, and Innovation Process Management, among others, designed to accommodate a wide range of audiences from undergraduates to corporate leaders and the judiciary. His academic positions include Faculty Fellow at the Segal Design Institute and Clinical Professor at Kellogg, with visiting faculty roles at institutions such as WHU in Germany, York University in Canada, and Keio University in Japan. His professional experience includes advisory roles and memberships on various boards and panels related to innovation, intellectual property, and economic development.

Research topics

• Medicine
• Cardiology
• Internal medicine

Selected publications

• 26-CCC-16804-ACC ANOMALOUS ORIGIN OF THE LEFT CORONARY SYSTEM FROM THE RIGHT CORONARY CUSP

  Journal of the American College of Cardiology · 2026-03-27

  articleSenior author
  PublisherDOI

• CONSTRICTIVE PERICARDITIS IN A PATIENT WITH RHEUMATOID ARTHRITIS

  Journal of the American College of Cardiology · 2022

  • Medicine
  • Cardiology
  • Internal medicine
  PublisherDOI

• AstraZeneca, Prilosec, and Nexium: Marketing Challenges in the Launch of a Second-Generation Drug

  Kellogg School of Management Cases · 2017-01-20 · 5 citations

  article1st authorCorresponding

  Tom McKillop, CEO of AstraZeneca, faced the classic quandary of large pharmaceutical firms. The firm's patent for Prilosec (active ingredient omeprazole) was expiring. Severe cost-based competition from generic drug manufacturers was inevitable. Patent expirations were nothing new for the US$15.8 billion in revenues drug firm, but Prilosec was the firm's most successful drug franchise, with global sales of US$6.2 billion. How could the company innovate its way around the generic cost-based competition and avoid the drop in revenues associated with generic drug market entry? AstraZeneca had other follow-on drugs in the pipeline—namely Nexium, an improvement on the original Prilosec molecule. Additionally, the company had the opportunity to introduce its own version of generic omeprazole, hence becoming the first mover in the generic segment, and/or introduce an OTC version of omeprazole that might tap into other markets. Ideally, AstraZeneca would like to move brand-loyal Prilosec customers to Nexium. In this market, direct-to-consumer advertising has remarkable efficacy. Classical marketing challenges of pricing and promotion need to be resolved for the Nexium launch as well as possible product and place challenges for the generic or OTC opportunity. Which combination of marketing options will allow the firm to best sustain the value of the original omeprazole innovation? The central objective of the case is to teach students how marketing variables can be used by first movers with diverse product portfolios to fend off severe price competition. These variables include pricing, promotion, product, and place (distribution) options as considered in the context of branded, generic, and OTC pharmaceutical market segments.

  PublisherDOI

• ttools (B): The Value of a Patent to the Entrepreneur

  Kellogg School of Management Cases · 2017-01-20

  article1st authorCorresponding

  A self-employed innovator developed and patented a novel combination pen and stylus device to complement the recently released Palm Pilot personal digital assistant. He presented his design to Palm, under a nondisclosure agreement to discuss the market response to the product, and his company, ttools, was subsequently allowed to advertise the device in a monthly e-mail to Palm customers. After ttools' release of the Throttle pen/stylus, Palm and the design firm IDEO introduced a similar pen/stylus device that appeared to infringe on ttools' patent. ttools, being a small, resource-constrained company, was in a precarious position. Its competitive advantage and rights as a patent holder were being threatened. It had few financial resources to draw upon, and thus its livelihood as a company was at stake. Investigates the available options ttools had to respond to Palm and IDEO's actions.

  PublisherDOI

• ttools (A): The Value of a Patent to the Entrepreneur

  Kellogg School of Management Cases · 2017-01-20

  article1st authorCorresponding

  A self-employed innovator developed and patented a novel combination pen and stylus device to complement the recently released Palm Pilot personal digital assistant. He presented his design to Palm, under a nondisclosure agreement to discuss the market response to the product, and his company, ttools, was subsequently allowed to advertise the device in a monthly e-mail to Palm customers. After ttools' release of the Throttle pen/stylus, Palm and the design firm IDEO introduced a similar pen/stylus device that appeared to infringe on ttools' patent. ttools, being a small, resource-constrained company, was in a precarious position. Its competitive advantage and rights as a patent holder were being threatened. It had few financial resources to draw upon, and thus its livelihood as a company was at stake. Investigates the available options ttools had to respond to Palm and IDEO's actions. To provide students with an understanding of how utility and design patents may be used by resource-poor entrepreneurs and inventors for building and maintaining a first-mover advantage.

  PublisherDOI

• Innovation and Intellectual Property in the Curriculum: Epistemology, Pedagogy, and Politics

  Technology & Innovation · 2017-09-01 · 5 citations

  article1st authorCorresponding
  PublisherDOI

• 3M ESPE AG: Managing Intellectual Property in the Dental Impression Materials Market

  Kellogg School of Management Cases · 2017-01-20

  article1st authorCorresponding

  ESPE, the market leader, is a medium-sized German manufacturer of precision dental impression materials competing in a shrinking market. To grow the business, ESPE invests substantial resources in innovative impression materials and associated distribution mechanisms. Squeezed by the shrinking market, the competition is increasingly using the proprietary channels (dispensing mechanisms) and brand equity (trademark) of ESPE to maintain their market share. There is a potential infringement. Explores how ESPE is organized to execute on the options imbedded in its IP rights. To provide students with an understanding of how to use brands and trademarks in conjunction with trade secrets, patents, and other forms of IP in mature markets to build and maintain innovation-based competitive advantage.

  PublisherDOI

• AstraZeneca, Prilosec, and Nexium: Strategic Challenges in the Launch of a Second-Generation Drug

  Kellogg School of Management Cases · 2017-01-20 · 2 citations

  article1st authorCorresponding

  Tom McKillop, CEO of AstraZeneca, faced the classic quandary of large pharmaceutical firms. Within the year, the firm's patent for Prilosec (active ingredient omeprazole) was expiring. Prilosec was a US$6.2 billion/year blockbuster that revolutionized the treatment of chronic gastro-esophageal reflux disorders (GERD). Severe cost-based competition from generic drug manufacturers was, however, inevitable. Patent expirations were nothing new for the US$15.8 billion in revenues drug firm. AstraZeneca had Nexium, an improvement on the original Prilosec molecule, in the pipeline. Ideally, it would like to move brand-loyal Prilosec customers to Nexium. Additionally, the company had the opportunity to introduce its own version of generic omeprazole, hence becoming the first mover in the generic segment, and/or introduce an over-the-counter (OTC) version of omeprazole. Tactically, AstraZeneca would like to use regulatory incentives and intellectual property rights to strengthen its competitive position. How could the company use its entire portfolio of intellectual properties—including patents and trademarks—to actively manage the priced-based competition and achieve a revenue growth strategy in the GERD market? An important objective of the case is to introduce students to the challenges of innovation and strategy in a regulated market environment. Additionally, students will learn the power of multiple forms of intellectual property used strategically along the product life cycle to build and sustain competitive advantage.

  PublisherDOI

• How to create commercial value from patents: the role of patent management

  R and D Management · 2016-05-20 · 92 citations

  articleCorresponding

  This article examines the relationship between patent management and indicators of a firm's financial and patenting performance. The empirical analyses are based on a sample of 158 technology‐based firms from the United States and Germany across multiple industries. The results show that two important dimensions of patent management, specifically patent protection management and patent information management, are positively correlated with a firm's level of financial profitability and the strategic and financial impact of its patent portfolio. This implies that patent protection and information management are important managerial capabilities of the firm that determine the level of value it can create from patents. We further find that a firm's technology strategy moderates the relationship between patent protection management and firm performance; it does, however, not moderate the relationship between patent information management and firm performance. Hence, the effectiveness of certain managerial capabilities on value creation from patents are contingent upon specific boundary conditions. Our findings have implications for improving firm performance through patent management.

  PublisherDOI

• ttools (B): The Value of a Patent to the Entrepreneur

  Kellogg School of Management eBooks · 2015-01-01

  book1st authorCorresponding
  PublisherDOI

Frequent coauthors

• John P. Visco

  15 shared

• Henry W. Stoll

  Northwestern University

  13 shared

• Wanlong Wang

  Tsinghua–Berkeley Shenzhen Institute

  11 shared

• Ling S. Ong

  Rochester General Hospital

  10 shared

• Joseph A. Paris

  10 shared

• Djavad T. Arani

  7 shared

• Holger Ernst

  WHU – Otto Beisheim School of Management

  5 shared

• Ivan L. Bunnell

  University at Buffalo, State University of New York

  5 shared

Awards & honors

• Professor of the Year, Northwestern University Master of Pro…
• Professor of the Year, Master of Science program at WHU in G…
• Faculty of the Year, Northwestern University MPD(2) program…
• Faculty of the Year, Northwestern University MPD(2) program…
• Faculty of the Year, AY2004