L3, Patents & Immaterial rights 2

Question 1

Different types of patent searches and analysis purposes?

Answer 1

1. validity search
2. patentability search
3. freedom to operate or clearance search
4. patent landscape search
   —> the broadest search

Question 2

describe the different search phases

Answer 2

SEARCH PHASE
1. scope
2. design
— what strategy?
3. execute
—> iterative process

ANALYSIS PHASE
4. analyze
—>

Question 3

Stages for sesigning the patent search?

Answer 3

1. identify relevant classes
2. identify relevant assignees
3. identify relevant keywords

Question 4

At what level should you stop when using classifications in your search?

Answer 4

Not too high, not too low, e.g. the bicycle maybe B62 or B62M.

Question 5

Typical process for analyzing patent information

Answer 5

1. Polish patent results
   —> check consistency in patent assignee names
   —> remove inactive patients
   —> rmeove irrelevant patent results
2. Technology area vategorization
3. Patent analysis and visualization

Question 6

Name some potentially valuable and useful information found in patents!

Answer 6

1. number of patents
2. filing date
3. kinds of patents
   —> system, method, use
4. geographical location
5. assigne
6. classification
7. described utility
8. inventor
9. citations
10. patent claims

Question 7

What is the typical working process for analyzing patent information?

Answer 7

1. Polish patent results
   —> check consistency in patent assignee names
   —> remove inactive patents
   —> remove irrelevant patent results
2. technology area categorization
   —> create understanding of the technology area
   —> map patent results into technology area sub-fields
3. Patent analysis and visualization
   —>quantitative analysis of patent information
   —> qualitative analysis of patents information
   —> complementing analysis with non-patent information

Question 8

what are the three perspectives of analyzing patent information?

Answer 8

1. Determine uniqueness of a technical solution
2. Explore and characterize overall technology fields
3. Explore and characterize actors patent opsitions

Question 9

Method for analyzing the uniqueness of a technical solution?

Answer 9

e.g. if it is a manufacturing method, divide the solution into solution feature and analyze it according to the feature, if correlation in too many features that patent should be carefully considered before going forward

Question 10

Method for analyzing technology fields and application areas?

Answer 10

1. what is the technical maturity?
   —> average umber of backwards citations
   —> frequency of patents compared to publications
   —> kind of patents
2. what is the development intensity?
   —> how many patents are currently filed?
   —> when was the earliest patent filed?
3. What technical aspects are companies trying to claim?
4. what utilities are being focused on?
   —> what utilities dimensions are descried n the “background” patent section?
5. what actors are leading in developing the technologies?
   —> assignees
   —> number of patents originating from assignees in a geographical region
   —> mapping country codes from patents over time
6. R&D investments: what are the agendas of others?
   —> number of patents over time?
   —> reading patents to find application areas
7. Where in the value chain will technologies in the field primarily be implemented?
   —> mapping patents related to different parts of the value chain

How does this differ accuse different fields?

Question 11

Example of how to analyze the maturity of different application areas for specific application?

Answer 11

Analyze the patent filing intensity within the different application areas.

Question 12

How can you use patents to analyze companies of relevance?

Answer 12

Analyze patent portfolio characteristics and the patent patent position of actors:
—> patent efforts: what is claimed?
—> where are the patent filled?
—> what areas of research focus?
—>who are prolific researcher and scientists?
—>what are core patents?

Question 13

Name some questions relating to an actor’s position, addressable with patent analytics

Answer 13

1. what field is the actor developing technology in?
   —> what kind of patents?
   —> number of patents in different fields
   —> what classification?
   —> read patents and map them in different technology fields
2. For how long has the actor been developing technology in different fields?
   —> patent application dates over time in different technology fields
3. What utilities within different technology fields is the actor trying to fulfill?
   —> what utility dimension are described in the background patent section?
4. What potential application areas is the actor patent in relation to?
   —> identification of explicitly stated applications in the patent

Question 14

What are the steps across the life time of a patent?

Answer 14

1. identify and define invention
   —> identify the potentially interesting solution and describe it in an invention disclosure document
2. Assess invention patentability
   —> bassed on the discloses document, the invention is analyzed from patentability and a patent viability perspective
3. Draft and file patent application
   —> If the invention is given a go ahead, a patent application is drafted and subsequently files based on different considerations
4. prosecute patent application
   —> once filed, an often long cumbersome dialogue with patent offices is needed to motivate that the application should be granted
5. decide to pay yearly annuities
   —> If the patent is granted, periodical payments must be made if the patent is to be kept in force
6. terminating the legal force of patent
   —> sooner or later all patents are legally terminated either after full term, invalidation or non-payment of annuities

Question 15

Biggest pros of using patents?

Answer 15

1. Patents an extremely useful technology and business intelligence source
   —>70% of the information in patents can not be found anywhere else.

2. The real advantage is to use patents TOGETHER with other information sources:
—> publications
—> market information
—> company information
—> etc.

Question 16

In what way could patent data be unreliable?

Answer 16

1. A patent covering a technology does not mean it exists on the market
2. Avoid reading too much out of quantitative information
   —> number of patents
   —> citations etc.
3. Time lag:
   —> patents are published 18 months after filing
4. Manual error
   —>classes are selected by patent examiners through a not entirely harmonized process