INNOVATION INDICATORS DERIVED FROM PATENT DATA

The patent system is one of the oldest institutions of market societies and it is designed to promote and diffuse innovation. A patent gives the inventor exclusive rights over the commercial exploitation of the invention for a limited period in return for publication of the invention. Patents provide a very valuable source of information on the temporal, geographical, sectoral and technological distribution of inventions. In the article the following patent indicators are discussed: Number of patents, patent growth percent in area, percent of company patents in area , cites per patent, current impact index, technology strength, technology cycle time, science linkage, science strength