the lack of readily identifiable and realisable value in the assets created via expenditure on innovation increases the risk that such investments could become shorttermist and cyclical especially among resourceconstrained smes which are likely to be juggling many conflicting priorities a recent study shows that of sme applicants at the european patent office applied for a patent in order to facilitate securing external finance compared with of applications from large firms de rassenfosse in france smes rely more on internal funds for their rd expenditure than large enterprises according to data from bpi france