The Innovation Study of Japan and US Semiconductor Companies <br/>—Internal Invention and Non-Internal Invention

Abstract

The negotiations with other firms (opponents) such as licensing are likely to take action as a routine-work of certain actions. It will make decisions in some paradoxical situation not only patent infringement lawsuit, but also cross-licensing negotiations in strategic business. It should be noted that inventions were regarded as only performance of R&D (Research & Development), which called them inventions for technological strategy. However, there exist inventions resulting from other factors, which are exactly defined as inventions for patent strategy; we shall call them inventions for patent strategy. So then, we picked out for several US and Japanese semiconductor manufacturers, and so our analysis separated out the number of inventions motivated by technological strategy within the whole set of inventions. Unlike other types of property, IP (intellectual property) assets lack clear property lines and every type of intellectual property you can own comes with connections to other valuable innovations. These ownership rights are also exactly changing. They are embedded in a dynamic technology context, one in which new innovations and new advances are constantly added. One of the best ways to examine that context is observing the legal property provided by patent citations, the references to the prior IP on which the patented inventions build. Patent citations are very important because they make the relationships among technologies and related property rights. The objective is to show that firms make inventions not only on technological factors, but also on patent strategy. Simple analysis method is proposed to identify how many non-internal inventions are filed for patents.