The value of invention patents in China: Country origin and technology field differences

This paper improves renewal payment based patent value model by introducing unexpired patents into the model. We estimate value of the invention patents based on SIPO records in China and compare values of patents between local owners and owners from the U.S., Japan and European countries. The study reveals that patent value from Chinese owners is much lower than that of overseas owners. This larger value gap implies important difference in motive of the patenting and R&D quality between China and those technology intensive sources usually from economically advanced countries and regions. The model developed in this study is also applied to patent data in different technical fields, successfully differing technical sectors with higher value (e.g., machinery) and those with lower value (e.g., pharmaceuticals), in terms of China market based patent records. Both applications prove that the newly developed model can be an important analytical tool for providing classified patent value on different purposes, especially in case of China.

► 550,000 invention patent of China is used for the first time in estimating patent value. ► The information of unexpired patent is considered when estimating patent value. ► The “forward value” of unexpired patent is estimated in the model.