Recent developments in Derwent publications' patent information services: A review with some predictions for the future

Recent developments in Derwent's patent information services are described. Electrical Patents Index is a new and sophisticated information retrieval service covering subjects of interest to the electrical and electronics industries. Patents Abstracts on Microfiche is a forthcoming service for simple and inexpensive searches through Derwent's entire collection of abstracts. Developments in Derwent's chemical coding system are briefly described, and major developments in its online data-bases are also described. The paper finishes with some speculations about the impact of new technology, particularly in regard to the mass storage of graphics and in-house spinning of mini-data-bases.     

The technical information provided by the European Patent Office

The search documentation of the European Patent Office at the Hague is essentially used in view of the tasks carried out within the framework of the European Patent Convention and the PCT and also for the preparation of search reports with respect to national applications filed in France, The Netherlands, Switzerland and Turkey. Moreover the general public can indirectly benefit from this search documentation through the standard or special search services. The standard searches are carried out on the basis of granted patents or patent applications (published or not) in compliance with the guidelines established for the European searches; the standard search report is identical to the European search report. The special services of the EPO encompass searches on: the state of the art, infringement, inventories, monographs, designed to respond to a great variety of needs.In the near future, the EPO will provide a direct access to its technical information through EURONET.     

Collections of patent documentation and the way Soviet specialists need them

The patent documentation system of the USSR comprise collections at four levels: the very comprehensive collections of the All-Union Patent-Technical Library (VPTB); industry branch oriented files; regional files; and local files of organization and factories. The files of VPTB form the basis for producing abstracts in Russian of foreign inventions, for microfilming industrial designs and utility models of several countries and for issuing various reference and information retrieval publications. The other three categories of files serve, as their names suggest, the needs of specific branches or organizations or are all-purpose files serving a whole region. The system of patent files is continuously upgraded as regards its functions and the services offered. The philosophy governing this as well as techniques for selecting patent documents to be required are described in the article. As in many other countries, there are no libraries in the USSR which exclusively collect files of patent documents (with the exception of the libraries of patent and invention offices). Until recently the All-Union Patent-Technical Library (VPTB) has been practically the sole establishment of this kind. In the early sixties, however, the facilities and collections of VPTB proved to be insufficient to satisfy the public requirements for patent documentation, rapidly growing in this country. This period was marked by efforts directed towards the creation of regional and sectorial files ofm patent documents for the specialists in industry and science. When these files were created the nature, purpose and peculiar features of industrial property documents was fully taken into account. At the same time, important decisions were taken, concerning the setting up of the State system of patent documentation files, the problems of controlling the process of forming the files became highly important. In the system of patent documentation being established, the industry branch oriented and regional files collected within the central bodies of scientific and technical information (STI) have become the major components. They provide facilities for conducting thorough patent searches to specialists of the industrial ministries and organizations of the country, irrespective of where the enterprise or organization is located. At the present stage, the structural arrangement of the patent documentation system is represented by collections at four levels: The first or higher level — VPTB. The collections here comprehensively represent the files of domestic and foreign patent documents over an unlimited period of time. The second level — industry branch oriented files; they cover exhaustively their respective industry sectors, mainly backlogged over the period of renewal of industrial products; they are primarily represented by patent documents of the countries where the industry sector of interest is highly developed. The third level — regional files, of all-purpose character. They are compiled of patent documentation of the major industrially or economically developed nations and offer facilities for conducting various comprehensive patent-related studies, including patent clearance searches. The fourth level — local files of organizations and factories compiled according to their specific needs; the period, fields and countries covered — all this is determined in accordance with the general layout of the respective branch-oriented file; local files are thus the source of specialized scientific and technical information of the organization or factory concerned.     

The future of prior art searching at the United States patent and trademark office

The United States Patent and Trademark Office has experienced an increased volume and complexity of patent applications in recent years, with resulting problems in maintaining pendency times and quality. As part of the Office’s 21st Century Strategic Plan to deal with this and other problems, the outsourcing of prior art patent searches has been proposed. In this article the author explains the current situation––including the existing partial use of search contractors, briefly surveys some solutions adopted in other patent offices, and then details the outsourcing proposals. It is intended that the contracting out of searches will proceed initially by means of a proof of concept pilot conducted on the search reports prepared by the Office on international applications under the PCT. Contractors will need to be able to demonstrate technical and legal competence, that there is no conflict of interest between these and other searches they carry out, and that they will maintain strict confidentiality. If successful, a wider implementation will be rolled out, with procedures in place to ensure that high quality searches are provided on a continuous basis. Analogous contracting out of classification and reclassification functions is also described.     

Computer-based patent searches: Using the IPC or free text?

Documentary indications of the British patent specification 14 79 444 are traced through various machine-readable stores (OTAF, DERWENT, CASEARCH, CLAIMS/US) and various printed collections (claims of German Offenlegungsschriften, US and GB abstracts and Chemical Abstracts). The traceability of patents such as GB 14 79 444 (electrolytic cell with diaphragm and titanium anodes with a catalytically active coating of platinum or ruthenium and their compounds) using the IPC and free text terms is compared. Symptomatically, it was found that free text searches go further than IPC searches, because they can reach a greater search depth.     

Similarity search in patents databases. The evaluations of the search quality

The article describes the evaluation criterion for similarity search in the patent search systems suggested by the authors. The use of artificial intelligence methods, artificial neural networks and machine learning for improving similarity search is described. The results of the comparison based on the proposed criteria for similarity search in Google Patent system, Yandex Patents system and the Russian patent office retrieval system PatSearch are given.     

A paperless patent documentation and information centre to assist in the transfer of technology to non-industrialized countries

Non-industrialized countries desiring to provide patent documentation and information services should seek cooperation with countries having similar backgrounds to form a regional patent documentation and information centre. This centre should supply bibliographic patent information, copies of patent documents, SDI services, state-of-the-art searches and novelty searches.A paper based patent collection is not feasible in view of the workload involved (more than 300 man-yr) and the necessary storage capacity (15 km of paper documents). Consequently microform and EDP facilities should be used whenever convenient.To provide information on patent documents of the member countries a centralized bibliographic data base and a complete collection of patent documents in microform should be established. Information on patent documents of other countries should be obtained from existing worldwide bibliographic data bases, and from search files existing elsewhere.Patent collections in microform of the most important countries should be acquired and for certain fields of high regional interest inhouse search files could be established.     

The setting up of a search system for patents at the Polytechnische Patentbibliothek of the Technische Hochschule,Ilmenau (Ilmenau Technical University)

The decentralized polytechnical patent library of the Technische Hochschule Ilmenau (GDR) is from the point of view of its structure and the nature of its services characterized by: a stock of documents limited in volume and optimized as far as contents and access are concerned and a computerized search system through which state-of-the-art searches and preliminary novelty and infringement searches can be carried out rapidly and in a cost-efficient way.The criteria for selecting the documents stocked, the approach to computerized analysis of documents and the search strategy are explained in detail. At present the system is being tested in the area of information technology.     

Problem pharmaceutical patents

These days, the number of pharmaceutical patent applications which do not specify the principal active ingredient in the form of a chemical name or structure is increasing. These patents are difficult to retrieve in retrospective on-line searches using chemical structures or keywords. Furthermore, even if you could find them, the situation with regard to patentability is obscure and this causes considerable problems for the experts in charge of the patent search. If you are a searcher for a large pharmaceutical company, you might already be apprehensive of infringing such patents. We, the JFA,^* gathered these patents together and studied the differences between their patentability in Japan, the US and the EPO.     

Development and use of an efficient patent information system in the German Democratic Republic

The G.D.R. is celebrating the fortieth year of its founding and the article details the patent information systems organized by the Office for Inventions and Patents. These include patent document and literature collections and computerized bibliographic and statistical information services.     

Abridgments of British patents — The end of an era

The Patent Law Amendment Act of 1852 and the coming into being of the “modern” British Patent Office is briefly mentioned. In 1852 Bennet Woodcroft F.R.S. was appointed Superintendent of the specifications and it was his idea to publish abridgments of each patent specification so that searches could be readily conducted in the Patent Office Library (or at home if the abridgments were purchased). The four series of abridgments covering the years from 1617 (or earlier in some cases) to the present day are described. Patent applications currently being published under the Patents Act 1977 contain abstracts of the specification on their front pages and there are several important differences between these abstracts and all the earlier series of abridgments. These differences are discussed and commented on and it is found that there are both advantages and disadvantages in the new system.     

Patent Information Centres – value added services through the network

An Employment and Economic Development Center (EED-Center) is a regional service point where the services of three departments of state are integrated to the same regional customer service center in the province. The ministries are the Ministry of Trade and Industry, the Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry, and the Ministry of Labour.The service concept of the centers will upgrade the quality of the services aimed especially at starting SMEs and for those who are developing their operations or products.The leading principle in establishing the EED-Center has been one-stop-shop-principle, in other words, you can get all services from the same spot. This principle has strengthened remarkably now that the services of National Board of Patents and Registration are available in EED-Centers.The co-operation started during the autumn 1998 and now SMEs can have the following services in all 15 EED-centers:

• trade register information services,

• trade register official notices and advisory services,

• patent applications, advisory services for applying for a patent,

• utility model, trade mark, design model, application and advisory services.

Five of the 15 EED-centers are committed to become Patent Information Centers, and in those centers we have built up a service based on video/PC contentions, shared databases and the services of examining engineers in FIPO. The service is aimed at the SMEs starting their business or developing their operations or products. The service concept consists of three different services:

• pre-evaluation of product-idea,

• examination of technical solution,

• technical evaluation of project proposal.

All services will be provided during a videosession between a customer, EED-Center-company analyst and the examining engineer in FIPO.The video connection is created between the FIPO and Patent Information Center with three fold ISDN-speed (384 Kb) on a standard PC, and during the session the examining engineer will connect to EPOQUE and share the data with the customer.The project is in the pilot-phase. After that we will make a decision on how to continue with the concept.     

Coopetition and innovation in high-tech firms: What we can learn from analysis of the semiconductor industry's patents

This study investigates coopetition among the 16 semiconductor firms that figured among the top 10 by revenue from 2009 to 2019 using patent data obtained from the Derwent World Patents Index™ (DWPI), considering records available for the selected firms published and indexed up to July 26, 2020. Only 1791 (0.17%) records from a total of more than 1.1 million have two or more of these competing firms as assignees (i.e., they are records for joint patents involving these firms), indicating the existence of coopetition in this scenario. These joint patents demonstrate coopetition between firms from different countries and in the main areas in which their patents are classified, indicating that they may coopete in those areas. Furthermore, mergers and acquisitions and joint ventures may influence coopetition and innovation, resulting in joint patents. Finally, a framework that consolidates the main findings is presented to guide future research. We contribute to the coopetition literature with novel inputs. From a managerial perspective, the findings can be used to build strategies to better exploit the potential of patents.     

Want to find? Break the rules!

My search strategies are messy; what does this mean? Is it a sign of intelligent quick and dirty searching? I sure hope so, but is it? That patent searching is an art after all? Could be, but it's probably only an art when conducted by the unconsciously competent ones among us and that brings me to the question: am I unconsciously incompetent or unconsciously competent?I am going to investigate this by taking a look at what my drivers are when I conduct searches: these drivers are the requirements of the client and my personal objectives which combined translate into a set of general objectives that I seem to use for most of my searches (primarily novelty and validity searches). These general objectives in turn determine how I tackle searching in practice. It turns out that I basically break every search rule there is.     

The future of PATLIB centres in a globalized patent world

The article focuses on the continuing requirement for patent libraries to adapt to the changing global environment in patent information. The drivers of these changes are outlined, including the ever-increasing inputs to, and publications of, the intellectual property offices, especially those in East Asia, allied to the changed priorities of SME users of patent information, from relatively basic information to more sophisticated searches and advice in the business-related environment. The author then reports the current views of the European PATLIB network on their future priorities for services such as database searches, training of IP users, technology transfer advice, and networking with partners who can provide complementary services. Some initiatives within the EPO’s policy for cooperation with member states are outlined, such as raising awareness and use of the patent system, patent information, and the exploitation of IP rights, especially amongst educational organisations and institutes and SMEs. The author accordingly argues that it is only through such adaptation that PATLIB centres will be able to provide higher quality, customer-related, added value services in support of innovation that are needed by users.     

Corporate management of patents: Role of the industrial librarian

This paper is directed for the most part to the Corporate Management of Patents, from a technical information viewpoint. The librarian, who is seldom the direct user of patents, should become knowledgeable in the rich resources of patent data. Technology transfer can be accomplished by the engineer and scientist having the complete picture, which the librarian offers in response to a search request. The General Electric Company is used as an example of corporate patent management. The author prepared two surveys. Major library schools were questioned on whether courses in Patent Information are part of the curriculum requirements of a special librarian. The other survey directed itself to several dozen major industrial libraries in the United States on patent handling and management. The results of these surveys are given. Although there are over 30 patent depositories in the United States (see Appendix I), the ‘average’ research librarian does not make complete use of these depositories. In some cases, the survey indicated they were unaware of these data sources.The paper describes several key patents within the General Electric Company supported by library research, and specifically, man-made diamonds. On-line retrieval systems, where patent license data is offered by NASA and DTIC, are an example of sources available to the aerospace librarian, and the paper concludes with a forecast of how libraries and special libraries will retrieve patents and patent applications before the next century commences.     

INPI, the Internet and electronic commerce

The information society has always raised important social, economic and cultural issues for our country. In the early days, Minitel was a major factor in user awareness and education in France. Internet-based technologies then offered the ergonomics and user-friendliness expected by a wide section of the public, both French-speaking and otherwise. Our task of disseminating industrial property information, which is a public service, was therefore facilitated by the fact that access was quick and easy and was available anywhere in the world seven days a week and 24 h a day.I – The patents web www.inpi.fr/brevets and esp@cenet: In order to reach as many members of the public as possible and as part of the esp@cenet project, since September 1998 the patents web www.inpi.fr/brevets has been offering access in French to the past two years of FR, EP and PCT publications, the full text of FR applications and a link to esp@cenet.Although the request forms seem simple, not every Internet user understands what professionals like ourselves mean by publication number, priority, filing, inventors, applicants or IPC code.The patents web www.inpi.fr/brevets therefore offers an added-value service, namely the natural-language search engine CIB-LN (in English this would be IPC-NL).This extremely powerful engine enables all French-speaking Internet users to identify the relevant patent classification codes in French using their own words, and to search with the utmost efficiency on the Net using both the patents web www.inpi.fr/brevets and any other patents sites which accept IPC entries.This achievement is currently the subject of a study of the transferability of the natural language search engine into other languages.We are currently experiencing the fourth commercial and marketing revolution, in the shape of electronic commerce. The first revolution involved the emergence of fairs in the Middle Ages, the second the establishment of department stores in the late 19th century, and the third the introduction of volume retailing in the 1950s.Electronic commerce therefore poses a major challenge to any private or public company. Marketing estimates and forecasts indicate that information marketing services will be among the most successful. INPI certainly hopes to take up this challenge.II – INPI shop: Our shop, which is in the process of being set up, will combine information marketing services with:

• trade mark priority and French Commercial and Companies Register (RNCS) searches;

• copies of patents;

• strategic and competitor information search (RISC) services;

• historical background;

• BREF, COSMOS, GLOBALPAT and RXN CD-ROMs;

• official publications.

The success and viability of an Internet shop is directly proportional to its links to other shops or service sites. It is therefore quite obvious that the INPI shop will be linked to direct INPI search systems (the patents, trade marks and companies webs) and to any other search service or shop which would like to be linked to it.     

Patent information in a changing world: Perspectives from a major patent office

The patent information field is in a state of flux, caused by new tools and changing habits and philosophies. In this article a number of major issues arising from this situation are discussed, some ways in which the EPO is responding are described, and some ideas on future developments provided.Patents are increasingly rated as valuable assets, but is patent information, and especially bibliographic patent information, being treated with the same meticulousness as in the past? More people are searching than ever before. But are they squeezing out the information professional? What effect will the IPC reform, the arrival of XML and other developments have? By focussing on completeness, timeliness and correctness, can patent offices make a contribution to alleviate the situation?The author concludes that, more than ever before, it is important that expert patent information professionals ensure that their views and needs are communicated to both initial data suppliers, mainly patent offices, and to commercial database suppliers and hosts.     

The organization of Patent databanks at the Ilmenau Institute of Technology

With the establishment of the Polytechnical Patent Library at the Ilmenau Institute of Technology in April 1981, an efficient patent information centre was set up for the southern districts of the German Democratic Republic (Suhl, Gera, Erfurt). First, the manual methods of search were complemented by two subsystems of the automized patent pre-search system, namely the selective dissemination of information and the field-oriented patent family service. In 1985, the set-up of patent databanks was begun. The present paper explains their specific features, thus complementing the conception of the patent pre-search system presented in previous papers.^(1,2) The information services are rendered by order of the Inventions and Patent Office.