Instruments for patent data analyses in business firms

The availability of patent data in data banks has largely increased the possibilities for patent analyses. In this paper we discuss overall measures of patent activity for individual firms. As the data are broken down by technology fields we introduce patent portfolios that represent the patent position of a firm relative to its competitors over all technology fields covered. We then use matrix algebra to suggest an alternative to standard procedures of importance weightings for patents, and we extent the analysis to show the relations between inventors and end-products via patents that are used in the end-products. This may have many applications, from inventor remuneration to human resource management. The paper concludes with suggestions for further research.