It should be noted that carefully conducted patent research play a fundamental role in ensuring the competitiveness of companies in the production and release of a new product in the future and are carried out on the basis of an analysis of sources of patent information and other information resources containing scientific and technical information regarding the object of new technology, information related to the development of new products, the state and prospects for market development.
Typically, patent research is carried out when:
- planning scientific research on new technology objects, forecasting the feasibility of their development and further production;
- planning the production of a new product on an industrial scale and determining the feasibility of its export;
- resolving the issue of granting patent protection to new objects of industrial property, selling and acquiring licenses for their production and sale.
It should be noted that patent research includes not only research into the technical level of new technology objects and determining the direction of their development, studying the directions of research and production activities of enterprises operating on the market for its production, identifying current consumer requests in the field of goods and services, but also an analysis of the current patent situation.
In addition, as part of the patent research, a technical and economic analysis is carried out, the choice of technical and design solutions for creating new equipment is substantiated, their patentability is analyzed and the feasibility of providing them with legal protection is justified both in the manufacturing country and abroad.
The patent purity of new technology objects is also examined, the feasibility of their sale abroad, the sale of licenses for their production and sale, the purchase of equipment and components necessary for production, etc. are determined.
The basic rules and requirements for conducting patent research are regulated by clause 6 of GOST 15.011-96 “Patent research” and include: development of a task for conducting it, regulations for the search, retrieval and selection of patent and scientific and technical information, systematization and analysis of selected information, summarizing the results and drawing up a report on the patent research.
The task specifies: the topic and its code, the objectives of patent research, analysis of goals, the nature and content of the work, performers of work and responsible persons, deadlines, reporting forms.
The search regulations are a program for conducting a search through funds of patent, scientific, technical and other information. Its requirements are also justified in accordance with the standard: subject and countries of search, sources of information, search depth and name of the information base. One of the most common types of patent search is thematic (subject) search.
The subject of the search can be a device, technological process or substance, and the choice of countries for searching information depends on the task of the patent research. For example, when checking the novelty of a technical solution, the search is carried out in the funds of Russia, Belarus, the USA, France, Great Britain, Germany, Japan, Switzerland and countries with the most developed field of technology being studied. When examining objects of new technology for patent purity, the search is carried out in the funds of countries where products will be exported or licenses will be sold and where the rights of patent holders should not be violated.
The main sources of information searched include: the International Patent Classification (IPC), the International Industrial Design Classification (IPDC) and the Cooperative Patent Classification (CPC).
I would like to separately touch on the importance of conducting a search for patent clearance of a new technology object, which must be ensured at all stages of the life cycle of a technology object, including the stage of research work, the stage of development, modernization or design of the object, as well as the stage of mass production.
It should be noted that the patent purity of an object is a concept that is inextricably linked with the existence of a patent, which grants its owner the exclusive right to use the invention. Items that are not covered by patents in a given country, including the case where the patent has expired, have patent clearance in that country, but if at least one element of the product has a patent, then the entire product cannot satisfy the requirements of patent clearance.
The concept of “patent purity” should not be confused with the concept of “patentability”, since the first refers to the legal property of technical objects (machines, equipment, etc.) and technological processes, and the second refers to the legal property of a technical solution, determined by the set of characteristics necessary to recognize it as an invention.
Based on the results of the search, a Report is compiled, the presentation of information and design of which is regulated by GOST R 15.001-96. The Patent Research Report is stored in the set of documentation for the object of economic activity in the prescribed manner.
In conclusion, it should be added that independent patent research can be complicated by the lack of access to paid databases, problems with translation and incorrect interpretation of the data obtained, as well as the lack of professional knowledge in preparing the Report, etc. For this reason, it is safer to trust specialists to avoid financial, reputational and time losses.
