Master in Engineering Policy and Management of Technology, 8 th Edition - Science & Technology Innovation Policy 1 - By Keith Pavitt SPRU – Science Policy Research Unit University of Sussex, (November 1997) “Do Patents Reflect the Useful Research Output of Universities?” Student: Rui Carvalho

Master in Engineering Policy and Management of Technology, 8 th Edition - Science & Technology Innovation Policy /10/2004 "Do Patents Reflect the Useful Research Output of Universities?"2 Summary -Points out the increase of patenting information to understand the nature, sources and consequences of technological change -Argues that patents granted to universities give a partial and distorted picture of the contributions of university research to technical change -Citations in patents to published research work offer a better idea of how university research contributes to technical change

Master in Engineering Policy and Management of Technology, 8 th Edition - Science & Technology Innovation Policy /10/2004 "Do Patents Reflect the Useful Research Output of Universities?"3 PATENTS A patent is an intellectual property right issued by authorized bodies to inventors to make use of, and exploit their inventions for a limited period of time (generally 20 years). Patents are granted to: firms, individuals or other entities The invention must satisfy the following conditions: novelty, non- obviousness and industrially applicable. Patent holder rights: legal authority to exclude others from commercially exploiting the invention (for a limited time period). Patent holder duty: the applicant must disclose all the information relating to the invention for which protection is sought. For further Glossary and Patenting Procedures see: “Compendium of Patent Statistics, 2004 (OECD)”

Master in Engineering Policy and Management of Technology, 8 th Edition - Science & Technology Innovation Policy /10/2004 "Do Patents Reflect the Useful Research Output of Universities?"4 Major Patent Offices European Patent Office (EPO) US Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) Japanese Patent Office (JPO)

Master in Engineering Policy and Management of Technology, 8 th Edition - Science & Technology Innovation Policy /10/2004 "Do Patents Reflect the Useful Research Output of Universities?"5 PATENTS and Innovation - Patents are a key measure of Innovation Output Patent Indicators - Levels of comparison: Countries, Regions, Firms, Industry, Technology Fields, etc - Reflect inventive performance - Track the level of diffusion of knowledge - Level of Internationalization of innovative activities - Measure the output of R&D performance (ex.: European Patents and US patents per capita – One of the Knowledge sub-indicators used to measure S&T performance in Key Figures ) PatentsOutput IndicatorInput Indicator

Master in Engineering Policy and Management of Technology, 8 th Edition - Science & Technology Innovation Policy /10/2004 "Do Patents Reflect the Useful Research Output of Universities?"6 Advantages of Patent Indicators 1)Close link to invention 2)Cover a broad range of technologies (biotechnology and nanotechnology have few other sources of information) 3)Patent documents are a rich source of information 4)Data is readily available (now by electronic means) Drawbacks of Patent Indicators 1)Value distribution of patents is skewed 2)Many inventions are not patented 3)Propensity to patent differs across country and industry 4)Differences in patent regulations across countries 5)Changes in patent laws (difficult to analyze trends over the time)

Master in Engineering Policy and Management of Technology, 8 th Edition - Science & Technology Innovation Policy /10/2004 "Do Patents Reflect the Useful Research Output of Universities?"7 TRIADIC Patents -Patented inventions for which protection has been sought at EPO,USPTO and JPO -Tries to identify the patents with higher commercial value -Eliminates home advantage

Master in Engineering Policy and Management of Technology, 8 th Edition - Science & Technology Innovation Policy /10/2004 "Do Patents Reflect the Useful Research Output of Universities?"8 Example of Triadic Patent Indicator Source: Key Figures

Master in Engineering Policy and Management of Technology, 8 th Edition - Science & Technology Innovation Policy /10/2004 "Do Patents Reflect the Useful Research Output of Universities?"9 Trends in Triadic Patent Families

Master in Engineering Policy and Management of Technology, 8 th Edition - Science & Technology Innovation Policy /10/2004 "Do Patents Reflect the Useful Research Output of Universities?"10 Trends in Triadic Patent Families  Two technology fields contributed substantially to the overall surge in patenting from : biotechnology and ICT.

Master in Engineering Policy and Management of Technology, 8 th Edition - Science & Technology Innovation Policy /10/2004 "Do Patents Reflect the Useful Research Output of Universities?"11 Trends in Triadic Patent Families

Master in Engineering Policy and Management of Technology, 8 th Edition - Science & Technology Innovation Policy /10/2004 "Do Patents Reflect the Useful Research Output of Universities?"12 PATENTING ACTIVITIES -Predominance of firms in patenting -“Size matters” – Large Firms in Science Based Sectors (Chemicals and electronics)

Master in Engineering Policy and Management of Technology, 8 th Edition - Science & Technology Innovation Policy /10/2004 "Do Patents Reflect the Useful Research Output of Universities?"13 Value of Patent Protection 1)European Firms Value Patent Protection more then US counterparts 2)Variation across industry in the strength of patent protection are similar in Europe and US (Except Cosmetics) 3)More effective protecting Products than Process (Except Petroleum Refining) 4)Valued more highly in chemical-related sectors Source: Pavitt, Table 2 –Inter Industry Differences in the Effectiveness of Patent Protection according to Large European and US Firms

Master in Engineering Policy and Management of Technology, 8 th Edition - Science & Technology Innovation Policy /10/2004 "Do Patents Reflect the Useful Research Output of Universities?"14 University Patents  In 1990 represented 5% of total US patenting (Rosenberg and Nelson, 1994)  University patents in the broad fields of chemistry, drugs and medicine represented 60-65% of the total US universities patents  Royalties income is negligible in the total R&D expenditure, nut nonetheless should be pursued (Conceição, Heitor and Oliveira, 1998) Difficulty in identifying University patents: - sometimes the inventor himself, mostly the professor, is also the applicant - sometimes the property rights are transmitted to a firm which appears as applicant. “Patenting by universities is not a potentially useful measure of university research performance.” (Pavitt, 1997)

Master in Engineering Policy and Management of Technology, 8 th Edition - Science & Technology Innovation Policy /10/2004 "Do Patents Reflect the Useful Research Output of Universities?"15  Patent applicants and examiners state “Prior art” - Mainly cite other patents and some science journals (Chemicals, instruments and elctronic-electrical equipment account for 75% of the journal citations)  “73% of papers cited by US industry patents are public modern science” (Narine et al., 1997) “Citations in patents to published papers provide a better picture of the academic research contribution to technical change.” (Pavitt, 1997) Citing Patterns in the US

Master in Engineering Policy and Management of Technology, 8 th Edition - Science & Technology Innovation Policy /10/2004 "Do Patents Reflect the Useful Research Output of Universities?"16 Patents and Useful Output of Universities