Getting Down to Basics:Using University and Corporate Patents to Identify Basic Inventions and Trace Their Diffusion

人们普遍认为，美国在基础研究方面仍处于世界领先地位，但在利用这些研究进行商业开发方面做得不够。尤其令人担心的是，大学和其他非营利机构的公共资助研究并没有产生尽可能高的效益，因为美国公司未能将这些研究成果商业化。这个项目有两个基本目标。一是根据专利引用的模式，发展一种量化发明“基本性”的方法。另一种是追踪发明，特别是基础发明的传播和随后商业化的地理格局，同样使用专利引文数据。1975年至1980年期间根据申请分配给大学的所有专利都将被确定。此外，美国公司专利的样本也将被确定为对照。这项研究将测试大学专利是否确实比公司专利更基础，以及通过引用模式衡量的一般基础专利是否被了解该研究的人认为是基础的。引用数据还将用于追踪大学和公司专利的任何后续商业化的地理位置。这项研究很重要，因为它将更好地理解技术变革和扩散的过程。

It is a widely-held view that the United States remains preeminent in the world in the performance of basic research, but does an inadequate job of commercially exploiting that research. In particular, it is feared that publicly-funded research at universities and other nonprofit institutions is not yielding the highest possible benefits, because of the failure of American firms to commercialize the fruits of that research. This project has two fundamental objectives. One is to develop a methodology for quantifying the "basicness" of inventions, based on the pattern of patent citations. The other is to trace the geographic pattern of diffusion and subsequent commercialization of inventions, particularly basic ones, again using patent citation data. All patents assigned to universities based on applications from the years 1975-1980 will be identified. In addition, samples of U.S. corporate patents will also be identified as a control. The research will test whether university patents are, indeed, more basic than corporate patents according to these measures, and whether patents that are generally basic as measured by their citation patterns are perceived to be basic by people knowledgeable about the research. The citation data will also be used to trace the geographic location of any subsequent commercialization of both university and corporation patents. This research is important because it will provide a better understanding of the process of technological change and diffusion.