Patent analyses based on PATSTAT applicant and address data

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Christian Soltmann
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Joined: Wed May 06, 2015 9:09 am

Patent analyses based on PATSTAT applicant and address data

Post by Christian Soltmann » Wed May 06, 2015 9:59 am

Patent information specialists are increasingly being asked to produce patent analyses which focus on general developments in a particular technological field or on the market environment of a particular company or institution.

In such cases, it is essential to get an overview of the activities of specific patent applicants. The value of the analysis will, however, depend very much on the quality of the patent data available, in particular the
applicant data.

Patent data suppliers and patent offices are applying a number of different measures to improve the quality of applicant data. The EPO, for example, has standardised most of the applicant names in its DOCDB database. And, since 2011, the applicant names in its PATSTAT database have been harmonised, and further information added, by the Catholic University of Leuven. These harmonised data are available free of charge (further information is available at https://www.ecoom.be/en/EEE-PPAT).

In addition to these activities, the EPO is engaged within its means in providing high-quality address data in PATSTAT. However, these efforts can only be successful if certain conditions are met for address data from a specific patent authority:
  • High-quality address data is delivered to the EPO by the competent patent authority.
  • The address data is fed into the DOCDB database, on which PATSTAT is generally based.
  • The publication of the address data is consistent with the data protection guidelines.
In PATSTAT, address data is available for several patent authorities, including the EPO: For applications filed with the EPO, the country of residence is generally available for the applicants and inventors and address data is available for about 90 per cent of the applications.

For other application authorities, the coverage may be less complete. To provide an example: For applications filed with the Japanese Patent Office, the country of residence is available for less than 5 per cent of the applicants and inventors. Address data for these applications is generally not available in the current PATSTAT edition.

Reflecting its quality and service orientation, the EPO is constantly aiming to improve the coverage and quality of the address data in PATSTAT. In this context, we suggest to follow the data coverage of future PATSTAT editions.


Christian Soltmann
Patent Information Promotion
EPO
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