Technological innovation strategy: how do technology life cycles change by technological area

Discussions on the patterns of technological innovation have significant implications in terms of the efficient distribution of national R&D resources and the establishment of corporate managerial strategies. This study is focused on calculating and analysing technology cycle time (TCT) by technological area based on patent data that can be used as easily accessible objective indicators for the purpose of modelling the patterns of technological innovation by period and technological area. The main technological areas handled by the study include medical science, vehicles, metallurgy, and computing. Of the patent data registered with the United States Patent and Trademark Office from 1990 to 2014, International Patent Classification sub-class codes representing each technological area were selected to collect patent data, and to generate TCT statistics every five years. The TCT statistics generated is interpreted as the technological life cycle, to be used in modelling technological innovation patterns individualised by technology and period.     

International Knowledge Flows and Productivity: Intra- vs. Inter-Industry Spillovers

The effects of international knowledge spillovers on total factor productivity (TFP) at the industry level are examined by using a panel of 13 manufacturing industries across 15 OECD countries over 23 years. We distinguish between intra- and inter-industry spillovers from the information on patent applications and citations. Patent data are taken from the Japan Patent Office and the United States Patent and Trademark Office. Using four alternative spatial panel estimation techniques, we find that international knowledge spillovers within the same industry significantly contribute to sectoral TFP. In contrast, there is little evidence of a positive effect of international knowledge spillovers on TFP across industries.     

Valuation of patents in emerging economies: a renewal model-based study of Indian patents

ABSTRACT

This study uses patent renewal information to estimate the private value of patents. Patent value refers to the economic reward that the inventor extracts from commercialising the patented invention. Our empirical analysis comprises 555 patents with applications filed between 1999 and 2002. The term of these patents either ended in 2018 or lapsed due to non-payment of the renewal fee. We model the renewal decision of patentee as ordered probit where patent renewal fee increases with the age of the patent. Variables, such as patent family size, technological scope, number of inventors and grant lag, are used as explanatory variables in the corresponding regression. Hence, this paper combines the patentee’s renewal decision along with patents’ characteristics and renewal cost schedule to estimate the initial rent distribution. We find that a large number of patents expire at an early stage leaving few patents with high value corroborating the results of studies using European, American and Chinese data. As expected, patents from certain technology class enjoy high valuation.     

‘Efficient’ market testing of the expectations-adjusted supply function hypothesis for Italy

This paper analyses the intertemporal adjustment process of price–cost margins at the four-digit Standard Industrial Classification (SIC) industry level. Our intial analysis shows the assumption that the adjustment process is consistent over all industries is inappropriate, while the assumption that the adjustment process is consistent over two-digit industries is supported in approximately 31% of the sample industries. We proceed to analyse industry-specific adjustment parameters and find that 50% of the sample are compatible with a decay of 90% of the supranormal return with four years and 85% of the sample exhibit margins that decay in approximately 10 years. Further analysis allows us draw some weak conclusions on the determinants of the adjustment parameter. We find a change in cocentration, high imports, a mature market and low research and development expenditures contribute to slightly lower adjustment coefficients and a faster decay of supranormal profits. Finally, the modelling of the adjustment coefficients highlights the risks associated with excluding outlier data points.     

Anticipating technology-driven industry convergence: evidence from large-scale patent analysis

ABSTRACT

Industry convergence has been the subject of many prior studies, yet most have focused on certain domains based on ex post evaluation. This study presents a systematic approach to anticipating technology-driven industry convergence using large-scale patent analysis covering all technology fields. Our approach includes patent co-classification analysis with the concordance between patent classes and industrial sectors to measure technological relations between industries; centrality and brokerage analysis to identify the specific roles of technology fields in industry convergence; and finally link prediction analysis to anticipate technology-driven industry convergence. A case study with the patents issued by the United States Patent and Trademark Office from 1976 to 2014 confirms that our approach provides a holistic and forward-looking perspective on technology-driven industry convergence.     

技术标准与专利权融合的制度挑战及应对

随着现代科学技术在生产和贸易中的作用日益突显,技术标准具有的技术先进、协商基础以及市场控制属性与专利权的私权属性产生紧密契合,专利权的作用和价值体现为标准制定、标准实施以及信息反馈的技术标准化全过程,技术标准与专利权融合已经成为普遍现象。技术标准与专利权融合导致原有标准各方相对均衡的利益格局被打破,不仅会阻碍标准实施,而且会助长权利滥用,使现有制度面临新挑战。为回应新挑战,从组建技术标准化组织,进行知识产权政策、专利法和反垄断法的制度创新与完善等方面提出政策建议,以实现制度升级,进而释放应然的制度绩效。     

Two-way relationship between innovation and market structure: evidence from Indian high and medium technology firms

ABSTRACT

This study analyses a two-way relationship between innovation and market structure in Indian high and medium technology firms. We perform an empirical analysis based on a simultaneous equation model on data for 991 high and medium technology firms during 2000–2015. Patent applications and patent grants capture innovation activity of the firms. We find that the market structure has an insignificant impact on innovation. A separate analysis of neck-and-neck firms also suggests that market structure has no impact on innovation. On the other hand, patenting has a positive and significant impact on market structure in both high and medium technology firms. The study concludes that in-house technology creation is a vital source of market dominance in Indian high and medium technology firms.     

An empirical analysis of patents flows and R&D flows around the world

In this article, we empirically investigate the effect of Research and Development (R&D) flows on patent flows around the world. We do this using an unbalanced panel consisting primarily of Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) countries that have both patent and R&D expenditure information broken down by domestic and foreign sources. Our analysis shows that even among a fairly homogeneous group of countries, the sources of patents and R&D differ substantially. Using a dynamic panel framework, we find that domestic R&D per capita increases domestic patents per capita only for the European Patent Convention (EPC) countries that already have a decentralized approach to innovation. Foreign R&D per capita increases foreign patents per capita in all countries even though foreign R&D constitutes a very small fraction of total R&D. We find that some of these differences can be attributed to the locations of the patent applications, including those to the European Patent Office (EPO), United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) and triadic patent applications to the EPO, USPTO and Japan Patent Office (JPO) simultaneously.     

A methodology to position nations’ efforts in a technology domain with a patent network analysis: case of the electric vehicle domain

When a nation is making strategies in a technology domain, it makes sense to know where the nation is currently in the domain and to know where other nations are as well. This paper presents a method to position nations’ efforts in a technology domain. The method builds a network of International Patent Classifications (IPCs) based on their co-occurrence in patent applications and applies an index called the Revealed Patent Application Advantage (RPAA), which reflects where nations’ efforts have been spent in a technology domain denoted as the IPC network. We applied the proposed method to position the efforts that have been spent in the electric vehicle (EV) technology domain by mainland China, Germany, Japan, and the United States.     

A model for measuring and ranking a firm’s patent portfolio

ABSTRACT

Patent quality (PQ) is a critical and complex factor of a firm’s patent strategy. We posit that the existing PQ models and their methodological approaches are limited in their ability to address the multiple priorities of PQ – a firm’s strategic intentions, its stakeholders and balancing technology superiority and legal validity. We advance PQ literature by identifying the fourth generation of strategic PQ indicators and propose a hybrid multi-criteria model, based on AHP–TOPSIS, for patent portfolio measurement. The proposed PQ model provides a simple template that can guide the decisions of patent managers pursuing high quality patent portfolios. We test the PQ model by applying it in two sectors: 3G WCDMA telecommunications and biotechnology.     

Does the position in the inter-sectoral knowledge space affect the international competitiveness of industries?

ABSTRACT

This paper empirically investigates how the inter-sectoral knowledge flows affect the international competitiveness of industries, once controlling for both cost and other technological factors. Using patent data on 14 manufacturing industries in 16 OECD countries over the period 1995–2009, we apply a network-based approach to capture the effect of industries' position in the flows of technical knowledge across industries, which we label inter-sectoral knowledge space. We find that (i) centrality and local clustering in the inter-sectoral knowledge space positively affect the export market shares of an industry, (ii) such two effects are rather redundant and (iii) national-level knowledge flows' impacts on international competitiveness are way stronger than international ones. Network measures of position in the knowledge space are found to be more relevant than standard technological indicators such as patent counts. Our results point to the importance of industries being well located in the stream of knowledge flows, rather than being innovative per se, and offer a novel yet robust proxy to measure technological factors affecting trade performances. In addition, we find evidence of geographical boundaries of knowledge flows.     

The role of industrial classification in the micro-macro integration: The case of the banking business in the 1997 North American industrial classification system

Although economic classification is not part of the Ruggles's prodigious contributions to the System of National Accounts, it is certainly meant to help achieve the integration and linking of macrodata with microdata. Unfortunately, economic classification is a component of the statistical infrastructure that often remains unquestioned by the existing industrial organization literature. This paper fills this gap using the banking business under the 1997 North American Industry Classification System (NAICS) as an example. More specifically, the paper ascertains the extent to which NAICS succeeds at combining the various activities performed by Canadian banks into homogeneous industries. Assuming that producing units within the same industry should display more similar cost structure than those in less similar industries, we find that NAICS—at least for the banking sector—is successful at identifying and grouping producing units into homogeneous economic activities. This result is particularly helpful for empirical research that relies on microdata to draw inferences on the structures, conduct and economic performance of the banking sector as whole.     

基于科学的产业创新主体专利合作伙伴识别研究

近年来,发展基于科学的产业已成为全球科技和产业竞争的焦点。基于科学的产业具有开放式创新特点,产业创新主体致力于寻找合作伙伴以充分利用外部资源。专利信息涵盖丰富的技术信息、法律信息及经济信息,是创新主体寻找合作伙伴并开展创新合作的重要资源,但鲜有学者运用专利信息研究基于科学的产业创新问题。构建基于科学的产业专利合作伙伴识别研究框架,以石墨烯这一典型的基于科学的产业为例,采用专利技术组合和社会网络分析方法,从行动者网络理论的4个行动者转译环节出发,全面展现我国石墨烯产业中最具潜力的国内和跨国专利合作伙伴识别过程,以挖掘专利合作机会并提高企业竞争优势。最后,从政府、高校、企业3个层面为我国石墨烯产业创新发展提供决策参考。     

中国金融发展对分类商品贸易竞争力的影响——基于1980年～2009年分类数据的实证研究

笔者基于国际贸易标准分类的一位数分类数据,使用协整方法实证研究了我国金融发展对不同行业外贸竞争力的影响作用.研究结果表明:我国各类商品外贸发展受金融深化的影响程度是不同的;资本、技术密集的商品类别受影响程度较高,而初级产品受价格和世界经济发展水平的影响程度较为显著;在所研究的9类商品中,有6类商品的外贸发展得益于金融深化进程.     

A Method for Identifying Actors in a Knowledge Based Cluster

The objective of the paper is to develop a method through which we can identify the actors (industrial, institutional and individual) who are active in technology development in the same or similar knowledge fields. The paper is, thus, aimed to make a methodological contribution to the literature, which has emerged on the systemic nature of innovation. The method involves broadening out from a starting point in a specific patent class, which corresponds as closely as possibly to the technological area of interest, to a set of related patent classes by using co-classifications and citations. After close scrutiny of both patent classes and patents, the actors in the new classes, as well as in the original class, are then identified. We try out the method on radio wave antennas for communication technology in Sweden. We find a range of firms and other actors in a whole set of industries, which bear little relation to one another in an input-output sense. Although we cannot ascertain the extent of linkages or relations between these actors, our hypothesis is that they constitute a cluster around radio wave antenna technology in Sweden.     

Booming or emerging? China's technological capability and international collaboration in patent activities

China's economy and technology have experienced astounding growth in the last two decades. The OECD 2005 reports show that China has overtaken the USA to become the world's largest exporter of information and communications technology goods. In order to assess the progress China has made in technology development, this study examines the inventive activities in China and the pattern of international collaborations between China and other major industrialized countries or regions. This study analyzes the patent data from the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) focusing on joint patent application between China and the eight most inventive OECD countries and two Asian economic entities (South Korea and Taiwan). The results reveal increasing collaborations in inventive activities between China and other major inventive countries over the past decade, and suggest that China's technology capability may have begun to boom along with its fast economic growth.     

美国信息技术领域专利政策分析及对我启示

高技术产业是真正建立在知识产权基础上的新产业。没有知识产权就没有高新技术产业。作为当前高技术产业的核心领域，信息技术产业更是建立在知识产权基础上的新兴产业，专利权是其中的关键因素。我们有必要研究美国的专利政策经验，为完善我国专利政策提供借鉴。     

EFFECTS OF PATENTS ON PRODUCTIVITY GROWTH IN KOREAN MANUFACTURING: A PANEL DATA ANALYSIS*

Abstract.  We analyse the contributions of patents to total factor productivity (TFP) performance in Korean manufacturing industries during the period 1981–1999. This paper treats potential autocorrelation problems seriously and uses recent panel cointegration approaches to investigate the robustness of the patent-TFP relationship. The results show that both domestic and foreign-resident patent applications have significant positive effects on productivity and that foreign-resident patent applications have a larger effect than domestic patents in improving TFP in Korean manufacturing. We also find evidence of knowledge spillovers among industries, in that the patent applications of other industries increase TFP in any single industry.     

“低端锁定”突破新路径:专利密集型产业研究综述与展望

如何打破跨国公司在全球价值链上设置的"俘获枷锁",已成为中国思考产业创新发展的核心问题。专利密集型产业作为我国产业自主创新和知识产权创造及运用方面具有比较优势的产业,其对国家经济增长具有较强的拉动作用。研究专利密集型产业主流文献,对专利密集型产业内涵、主要影响因素与评价标准、发展路径等进行系统分析,在总结专利密集型产业突破"低端锁定"效应的基础上,进一步挖掘提升优势转化效率路径的理论空间。     

Knowledge Spillovers in Europe: A Patent Citations Analysis

This paper addresses the pattern of knowledge flows as indicated by patent citations between European regions. Our findings support the hypothesis that there are important barriers to knowledge flows in Europe. Patent citations occur more often between regions which belong to the same country and which are in geographical proximity. Furthermore, patent citations are industry specific and occur most often between regions that are specialised in industrial sectors with specific technological linkages between them. Patent citations are also more frequent when the citing region belongs to the same linguistic group as the cited region.
JEL classification : O 30; O 33; R 19