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Sources of inspiration? Making sense of scientific references in patents

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Abstract

Scientific references in patent documents can be used as indicators signaling science-technology interactions. Whether they reflect a direct ‘knowledge flow’ from science to technology is subject of debate. Based on 33 interviews with inventors at Belgian firms and knowledge-generating institutes active in nanotechnology, biotechnology and life sciences, we analyze the extent to which scientific references in patents reflect sources of inspiration. Our results indicate that scientific knowledge acts as a source of inspiration for about 50 % of the inventions. At the same time, the scientific references cited in patent documents and available in patent databases do not provide an accurate picture in this respect: 30 % of patents that were inspired by scientific knowledge do not contain any scientific references. Moreover, if scientific references are present, half of them are evaluated as unimportant or background information by the inventor. Overall, these observations provide evidence that scientific references in patent documents signal relatedness with the implied inventions without necessarily implying a direct, inspirational, knowledge flow between both activity realms.

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Notes

  1. For some applications, see e.g. Guan & He (2007), Lo (2010), Ribeiro et al. (2010) and Tijssen (2000, 2001).

  2. By including the scientific non-patent references, this issue can at least partly be addressed.

  3. Based on a sample of 50 Dutch USPTO patents (1993-1996).

  4. Located in France, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, Spain and the United Kingdom.

  5. Including this category does not alter the reported findings.

  6. This appears to be additionally confirmed by a positive correlation between the number of patent references and the number of scientific references in patents.

  7. An additional check reveals that the patterns observed in Table 3 are similar when the sample is split between firm versus KGI patents.

  8. Note that Vanderbeke’s (2006) sample includes USPTO patents as well.

  9. In this section, 4 patents are dropped because the inventors were not able to provide us with sufficient information on the individual references. Thus, our results are based on 14 of the 18 patents with scientific NPRs reported in Table 3. The average number of scientific non-patent references wag 3.92 (sd: 2.67, max: 10).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. ECOOM, KU Leuven, Waaistraat 6, 3000, Leuven, Belgium

    Julie Callaert & Bart Van Looy

  2. MSI, Faculty of Business and Economics, KU Leuven, Naamsestraat 69, 3000, Leuven, Belgium

    Julie Callaert, Maikel Pellens & Bart Van Looy

  3. IGS, University of Twente, P.O. Box 217, 7500 AE, Enschede, The Netherlands

    Bart Van Looy

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  1. Julie Callaert
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  2. Maikel Pellens
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  3. Bart Van Looy
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Correspondence to Julie Callaert.

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Callaert, J., Pellens, M. & Van Looy, B. Sources of inspiration? Making sense of scientific references in patents. Scientometrics 98, 1617–1629 (2014). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11192-013-1073-x

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