Patent families: When do different definitions really matter?

Data on patent families is used in economic and statistical studies for many purposes, including the analysis of patenting strategies of applicants, the monitoring of the globalization of inventions and the comparison of the inventive performance and stock of technological knowledge of different countries. Most of these studies take family data as given, as a sort of black box, without going into the details of their underlying methodologies and patent linkages. However, different definitions of patent families may lead to different results. One of the purposes of this paper is to compare the most commonly used definitions of patent families and identify factors causing differences in family outcomes. Another objective is to shed light into the internal structure of patent families and see how it affects patent family outcomes based on different definitions. An automated characterization of the internal structures of all extended families with earliest priorities in the 1990s, as recorded in PATSTAT, found that family counts are not affected by the choice of patent family definitions in 75% of families. However, different definitions may really matter for the 25% of families with complex structures and lead to different family compositions, which might have an impact, for instance, on econometric studies using family size as a proxy of patent value.     

Patent analysis using online databases — II. Competitor activity monitoring

Patent analysis has been the subject of academic interest for some 30 years or more, because of its potential as an econometric measure. For industrial information units, which lack the manpower to carry out the extensive and time-consuming calculations involved, it can nevertheless be a valuable aid to decision-making in such areas as acquisitions and divestitures, R&D planning and new product development. Access to online patents databases and simple analytical software allows the information specialist to obtain measures of technological and competitive activity which, if not always statistically verifiable, may help focus attention on underlying trends.This is the second of two papers on the subject, listing techniques, accompanied by examples, which may be used for competitor activity monitoring. Technological trend analysis was covered in the previous paper (part I, World Patent Information Vol. 9, No. 1).     

Regional Innovation Measured by Patent Data—Does Quality Matter?

This paper devises a new way of measuring the geographical scope of innovation based on patent data and compares its geographical distribution with that of patents granted and production. Indicators of patent quality are used to form an index of regional innovation, which is argued to be an improvement over patent counts, which are seen as indicators of inventions. Innovations are more concentrated than inventions, which in turn are more concentrated than production, gauged by employment levels. Innovations are, moreover, concentrated to regions with already high production and invention levels. This indicates that the concentration of innovation is understated, as raw patent counts are used to proxy for innovation rather than quality patents. The results further point to the need for revaluing effect of R&D on local innovative activity.     

Patent analysis using online databases—I. Technological trend analysis

Patent analysis has been the subject of academic interest for some thirty years or more, because of its potential as an econometric measure. For industrial information units, which lack the manpower to carry out the extensive and time-consuming calculations involved, it can nevertheless be a valuable aid to decision-making in such areas as acquisitions and divestitures, R&D planning and new product development. Access to online patents databases and simple analytical software allows the information specialist to obtain measures of technological and competitive activity which, if not always statistically verifiable, may help focus attention on underlying trends. This paper lists a number of suitable techniques, accompanied by examples, which may be used to study technological trends. A second paper will be devoted to competitor activity monitoring.     

Citations to the “Introduction to informetrics” indexed by WOS,Scopus and Google Scholar

Google Scholar and Scopus are recent rivals to Web of Science. In this paper we examined these three citation databases through the citations of the book “Introduction to informetrics” by Leo Egghe and Ronald Rousseau. Scopus citations are comparable to Web of Science citations when limiting the citation period to 1996 and onwards (the citation coverage of Scopus)—each database covered about 90% of the citations located by the other. Google Scholar missed about 30% of the citations covered by Scopus and Web of Science (90 citations), but another 108 citations located by Google Scholar were not covered either by Scopus or by Web of Science. Google Scholar performed considerably better than reported in previous studies, however Google Scholar is not very “user-friendly” as a bibliometric data collection tool at this point in time. Such “microscopic” analysis of the citing documents retrieved by each of the citation databases allows us a deeper understanding of the similarities and the differences between the databases.     

Patent protection: does it promote or inhibit the patented technological knowledge diffusion?

Patents not only promote the dissemination of technological knowledge through the disclosure of innovative information, but restrict the use of patented technology by the public within the scope of the law. With this exclusive protection on the premise of information disclosure, it is ambiguous whether patents help or hinder the diffusion of knowledge within the span of patents. This study first constructs a multidimensional index of patented technological knowledge diffusion (PTKD) from spatiotemporal aspects, and compares the differences in technological knowledge diffusion of four types of patents—valid patent (VP), zero-cited patent before expiration (Z-B), zero-cited patent after expiration (Z-A), and non-zero-cited patent before and after expiration (NZ-BA). Then, the impact of patent protection—patent lifetime (PL), the number of independent claims (NIC), the number of words in the first independent claim (NWF)—on the degree of PTKD is explored. The results demonstrate that NZ-BA has the highest level of PTKD in terms of growth rate, technological and geographical breadth and depth, followed by VP. Meanwhile, PL affects the diffusion growth rate and technological and geographical breadth negatively, NIC positively affects the diffusion average speed and technological and geographical depth while NWF only positively affects the technological depth of diffusion. These findings highlight the role of different types of patents in promoting technological innovation and promote a better understanding of the correlation between patent protection and PTKD, which provides support for decision-makers to protect property protection and guides the patentees to protect their long-term economic and technological benefits.

     

Patent activity on water pollution and treatment in China—a scientometric perspective

This research intends to investigate the patent activity on water pollution and treatment in China (1985–2007), and then compares the results with patents data about Triadic patents, South Korea, Brazil and India over the same periods, patents data were collected from Derwent World Patents Index between 1985 and May 2008. For this study, 169,312 patents were chosen and examined. Total volume of patents, technology focus, assignee sector, priority date and the comparison with other countries are analyzed. It is found that patents on water pollution and treatment filed at China have experienced a remarkable increase and the increase rate of patents filed at China change simultaneous with the percentage of domestic applications. However, the number of high quality Triadic patents with priority country as China remains small. Furthermore, in addition to individual patent assignees, both Chinese universities and enterprises also play important roles in patent activity of water pollution and treatment. In addition, the pattern of South Korea’s development can provide short-term implications for China and the regularity in Triadic patents’ development can provide some guidance to China’s long-term development. In contrast, the development pattern of Brazil and India is less influential to China’s development. Furthermore, China’s technology focuses on water pollution and treatment seem to parallel global and triadic patent trends. This research provides a comprehensive picture of China’s innovation capability in the area of water pollution and treatment. It will help China’s local governments to improve their regional S&T capability and will provide support the National Water Pollution Control and Treatment Project in China.     

Obsolescence or opportunity? Patent & trademark librarians in the Internet age

The effect of the Internet databases offered by IBM and by the USPTO on a US patent and trademark library is described. For example, document delivery has declined significantly. Implementation of a substantial price reduction by the library for this service has arrested the decline. A charged trademark search service has been launched on the back of an increased number of statutory trademark applications in the USA, and is proving popular. Another activity, awareness of IP issues, has also been expanded, especially on their website.The author concludes that the net result of all these changes is hard to predict. However she foresees that the collating of statistics on the number of users, the nature of their research, and their affiliation, will increasingly be needed as the Internet Intellectual Property services further impinge on the work of traditional patent information providers.     

Patent citation network analysis of core and emerging technologies in Taiwan: 1997–2008

Identifying core technologies and emerging technologies is essential for formulating national technology strategies and policies for pursuing technological competitive advantage. This study presents a quantitative method for identifying core technologies and emerging technologies in the Taiwan technological innovation system. The objective was to gain an overview of technological development in the country by analyzing patent citation networks and by identifying five core technologies and emerging technologies in Taiwan based on United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) patents granted to Taiwan during 1997–2008. The findings indicate the most appropriate management of technology and innovation and the best patent strategy and technology policy that the Taiwan government should pursue. Research institutes, industries and academia are also given research directions for choosing the technologies in which they should invest resources in order to strengthen the Taiwan technological innovation system and to increase its competitive advantage in global technology.     

Patent activity by date of application — Estimating recent applications in the U.S. patent system

Using the number of patents applied for each year can be a useful indicator of the level of inventive effort and a more accurate measure than one based on patent issue date. In the U.S. patent system, this indicator is hampered by the closed examination process, which results in an undercounting of applications field in the recent past.This article describes a method for overcoming this problem by estimating recent patent activity by date of application for U.S. patents. The method uses the historical data for the time between application and issue and can be used to estimate activity by application date up to one year before the date of the most recently issued patents.