button button button button button button button button button button button button
Side Image
Page Banner

Beyond Advanced Patent Searching

The Analysis and Strategic Use of Patent Literature

 

    Patent literature is unique. It often features information not available in other resources. Patent literature is also extensive. This combination of uniqueness and large numbers offers the possibility of providing knowledge and information beyond the usual answers associated with traditional patent searches.

    For example, researchers can employ sophisticated analyzing and tabulating features available on several fee-based patent databases to learn some of the following things about a technology and the firms active in it (see generally Hoetker):

     

 

 

  • The top inventors and experts in certain fields and technologies;

     

  • An indication of whether or not top talent in a field has moved to a different employer;

     

  • The "geography of patenting," which can indicate whether or not an organization has internationalized its research and development efforts;

     

  • Patent citations can indicate whose technology a company is building on;

     

  • Conversely, citations can indicate who is building on the technology of a target company.

 

 

On the USPTO website, it is possible to carry out some of this type of research yourself.

For example, to find "who is building on who," you can see which other patents cite a particularly patent by using the REF field code in a search.

REF/4,615,002 retrieves all of the patents that cite Patent Number 4,615,002.

Within the text of a patent, you can also simply click on the Referenced By link in the References Cited field:

 

References Cited [Referenced By]

Research using patent literature also suggests that "links" exist "between corporate patent and patent citation data and several other indicators of corporate performance" (Narin, et al., 1987, 1984).

Some researchers are even using "patent-related measures to predict stock returns and market-to-book ratios" because "empirical results indicate that patent measures reflecting the volume of companies' research on subsequent innovations, and the closeness of research and development to science are reliably associated with the future performance of R&D-intensive companies in capital markets" (Deng, et al.).

Finally, patents are increasingly being used by companies "as competitive weapons to capture and defend markets, outflank rivals, and increase revenue. These firms regard patent strategy as a new core competency of the modern enterprise and an important factor in their success" (Rivette and Kline, p. 3).

Patent searching in these companies is part of an ongoing intellectual property analysis that is part of a lucrative strategy. For example, by determining which companies were citing their patents, one firm quickly identified a customer in the divestiture of a business unit. This patent search "helped them find and close the deal in a third less time and at a 20 percent higher price, which was worth 'millions of dollars,'" according to a company spokesmen (Rivette and Kline, p. 162).

An excellent book that discusses these trends is Rembrandts In The Attic: Unlocking The Hidden Value of Patents by Kevin Rivette and David kline.


NEXT >