Highlights:

• The broad provider landscape is distinguishable according to costs and employed means.
• Public providers focus on fundamental digitalization trends, e.g. machine translation for patent search tasks.
• Commercial providers focus on more sophisticated digitalization trends, e.g. predictive analytics for patent analysis tasks.
• Major digitalization domains emerge: cloud computer technology, data management, data analytics, and artificial intelligence.
• The 15 identified trends offer chances for but also exacerbate tensions between stakeholders.

Abstract:

Digitalization is a strong driver in society, business, and science. Patent management, especially the search for and analysis of patents, is also being shaped by digitalization advances. Unlike prior studies – which mainly focus on the purposes and methods used for patent search and analysis –, this review focuses on the underlying digitalization trends that have become mainstream in the landscape of providers’ patent information databases and interrogation tools. By analyzing seven public and 20 commercial providers, a total of 15 different digitalization trends are outlined. Public providers specifically focus on trends for patent search, e.g. machine translation, while commercial providers rather focus on more sophisticated trends for patent analysis, e.g. predictive analytics. All of the 15 identified trends point toward four digitalization domains that were discerned by means of a hybrid coding approach, namely cloud computer technology, data management, data analytics, and artificial intelligence. Conclusively, tensions that are caused by the progress of these trends are discussed, e.g. the seamless transition from search to analysis versus less explainability.

Walter, L., Denter, N., & Kebel, J. (2022). A review on digitalization trends in patent information databases and interrogation tools. World Patent Information, 69, Article 102107. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.wpi.2022.102107

Free access until May 10, 2022: https://authors.elsevier.com/a/1encb_3wd9NEpE.