• Journal of the Ergonomics Society of Korea
• /
• v.34 no.5
• /
• pp.501-517
• /
• 2015

Objective: The aim of this study was to investigate the technology trend on developing helmets based on the analysis of Korean, US, European and PCT patents. Background: The usage of the personal protective equipment such as the safety helmet would be essential for preventing injuries and reducing the severity of injuries depending on the type of activity and the exposed environment. Method: Database of WIPSON was used for searching the patents. The objects were the Korean, US, European and PCT patents registered or opened from January 2011 to December 2014. The keyword to investigate was helmet, and International Patent Classification (IPC) was used for investigating the technology trend of the patents. Results: The cases of US patents annually increased, but the cases of European patents decreased. US patents belonged to all sections but Korean and European patents and PCT patents did not. The largest number of IPC, to which four areas' patents belonged, was 'Headwear' and the second largest one was 'Hygiene'. In the subgroup level, the most common largest subgroups were 'Parts, details or accessories of helmets' and 'Masks, shields, or hoods for welders'. Korean patents had the lowest ratio of single_IPC at 11%, but the ratios of single_IPC for US and European patents were 52%, respectively. 'Human necessities', 'Mechanical engineering', 'Physics', and 'Electricity' were used as a single_IPC, but lower levels of 'Performing operations', 'Chemistry', 'Textiles' and 'Fixed constructions' were used as multi_IPC. Most main applicants had patents which belonged to 'Human necessities'. Conclusion: The cases of US patents annually increased unlike others. The common technologies for creating the helmet were Parts of helmets under Headwear and Shields for welders under Hygiene. Many Korean patents tended to be categorized as multi_IPC, different from others. Application: To know the technological characteristic of patents would be helpful to initial stage developers.

• Tribology and Lubricants
• /
• v.38 no.4
• /
• pp.143-151
• /
• 2022

This study analyzes patents related to oil diagnosis of construction equipment. Oil diagnosis is extremely important for maintaining construction equipment properly. Through the evaluation of existing patents, a patent strategy for the future construction equipment market is presented. The related patents are classified and selected in several steps. Finally, 16 valid patents are selected and analyzed in detail. In the classification process, patents are classified by country, year, and company. A market analysis shows that the top 10 companies have a market share of more than 50. In addition to patents related to the oil analysis of construction equipment, patents related to automobile oil analysis and development of oil sensors are investigated to identify the contents of patents in other fields that can be applied to oil diagnosis technology for construction equipment. Moreover, not only the contents of research articles of two Korean construction companies, but also the research trends in the literature in this field are used in the analysis. The related patents of the two Korean companies are few. Companies with a high market share, including Caterpillar, hold many patents, and patents for diagnosis algorithms using such technologies as artificial intelligence and artificial neural networks, along with oil sensor-based condition monitoring technology, are gradually expanding.

• Korea Trade Review
• /
• v.47 no.6
• /
• pp.211-228
• /
• 2022

With the advent of a recent knowledge-based society, interest in patents is steadily increasing. The patent is an important indicator that can capture the level of R&D investment and technology development. In an era of deepening new protectionism and the pandemic of COVID-19, patents play an important role in sustainable economic development and establishing a strong domestic industrial ecosystem. In this paper, we analyze the impact of patent applications on the corporate performance of the Korean manufacturing industry over the past 21 years from 1999 to 2019. We divide patents into overseas patents and domestic patents and analyze the respective effects on the entire manufacturing industry, ICT industries, and non-ICT industries. Major findings are summarized as follows. First, patents have a positive effect on both exports and sales of Korean manufacturing companies. Second, overseas patents have a greater impact on corporate performance than domestic patents. Third, Patents have a more positive effect on ICT industries than on non-ICT industries.

• The Korean Journal of Food And Nutrition
• /
• v.30 no.6
• /
• pp.1199-1209
• /
• 2017

Food environment has been going through significant changes with the introduction of Information and Communication Technology (ICT). This study was conducted to investigate the current development status of ICT related to food delivery service by analyzing the relevant registered patents according to consumer buying process. Patents registered between 2002 and 2016 were searched with 'food' and 'delivery' as main keywords through Korea Intellectual Property Rights Information Service (www.kipris.or.kr). The search resulted in 624 patents among which 219 patents were related to food delivery service; 108 patents based on ICT were selected and analyzed. The patents were examined by applicant and year. The patents were classified into the six steps of consumer buying process: 'need recognition', 'information search', 'evaluation', 'choice', 'purchase', and 'postpurchase evaluation'. Patents belonging to more than one step were coded to all the corresponding steps. The patents were registered mainly by domestic companies (50.9%) and individuals (35.2%), having shown dramatic increase of registration since 2012. Over 2/3 (67.6%) of the patents were related to the 'purchase' step. About 32% were associated with the 'information search' step. Approximately 18% of the patents were relevant to the 'evaluation' and 'choice' steps, respectively. The numbers of patents related to the 'postpurchase evaluation (13.9%)' and 'need recognition (12.0%)' steps were relatively low. The current ICTs related to food delivery service in Korea were largely associated with service providers' profit generation rather than consumers' benefit. There is still much room for technology development that could contribute to increasing consumers' benefit.

• Journal of Oriental Neuropsychiatry
• /
• v.33 no.3
• /
• pp.287-299
• /
• 2022

Objectives: The purpose of this study was to analyze the trend of natural product-based products for sleep improvement in Korean patents, to enhance the development and application of natural-products for sleep disorder in terms of Korean medicine. Methods: We collected patent data using the KIPRIS database and ScienceON database. Two authors independently screened patents that potentially met the criteria, and assessed full texts of screened patents for eligibility. Included patents were analyzed, quantitatively as well as qualitatively. Results: A total of 60 patents were selected 2008-July 2022. The number of patents have been on the rise since 2017, and reached 12 in 2018. Companies have registered the most patents, followed by the Industry-University Cooperation Foundation. Zizyphi semen (n=6), Lactuca sativa L. (n=5), Valeriana fauriei/officinalis (n=4), Poria cocos (n=4) were frequently used herbs among 60 patents. Twenty-one patents (35%) included medicinal herbs with sleep improving effects. Among 60 patents, alcohol extraction (70%) was mostly used, followed by water immersion (50%), and hot water extraction (48.3%). Conclusions: Analysis results showed that various Korean medicine herbs, are being used for natural-products for sleep disorder. The results will be helpful towards inventing new patents using Korean medicine, developing natural product extracts for sleep improvement, and extending the range of these products in clinical use.

• KDI Journal of Economic Policy
• /
• v.42 no.3
• /
• pp.33-52
• /
• 2020

Patents are widely used in the literature as a measure of firm-level innovation. It is regarded that patents improve a firm's operational environment and ultimately increase the value of the firm. However, the relationship between patents and firm value in Korea is under-explored in the literature due to the difficulty of constructing datasets. This paper examines whether patents in Korea increase the market value of a firm. To do this, I exploit novel data on firm-level patents and financial information of all listed Korean companies during the period of 1993-2015 and estimate the non-linear production-function type of Tobin's q equations on R&D, patents, and citations. Surprisingly, I find that patents and citations are weakly associated with firm value, while R&D is strongly associated with an increase in firm value. These results direct imply that policymakers in Korea should enhance patenting incentives to encourage firms to innovate.

• Journal of Engineering Education Research
• /
• v.21 no.6
• /
• pp.81-89
• /
• 2018

Patents have been recognized as a core knowledge asset which are closely related with company's technological competitiveness. However, only a small portion of patents are actually contributing to the profit of the company. In addition, it costs a lot of money continuously to maintain the patent rights regardless of their values. Thus, effective methodologies are required to create patents with high values. It is examined what kind of differences exist between high value patents and the others in the use of TRIZ methodologies. For the purpose, we analyzed the US granted patents of Samsung Electronics. The analysis shows that there is no significant difference in the use of inventive principles, but high value patents utilize 'separation by condition' the most where as the others 'separation by space' the most frequently in the use of separation principles. In the use of standard solutions, high value patents use the 'class 2' principles frequently than the others.

• The Korean Journal of Food And Nutrition
• /
• v.27 no.4
• /
• pp.619-629
• /
• 2014

The purpose of this study was to examine the current status of patents related to dietary life of the elderly in Korea. Using Korea Intellectual Property Rights Information Service, patents registered between 2002 and 2013 were searched with the key words including 'elderly or the aged' and 'food, meal, or dietary life.' The search results showed 1,438 patents, and 500 patents meeting the research purpose were selected and analyzed. They were divided into two categories: 'patents on foods' and 'patents on products and services related to dietary life.' The former was further divided into four subgroups as follows: foods for health promotion, foods for disease prevention, foods for the people with difficulty in swallowing and masticating, and others. Also, the latter was divided into products or services. The results showed that patents on foods accounted for about 90%, of which the patents on foods for health promotion were ranked as the highest (40%). The number of patents on products and services related to dietary life was relatively small, indicating that the technology development has been focused on foods. Therefore, the technology for products and services related to dietary life should be actively developed as well as that for foods to improve the quality of life for the elderly in the future.

• The Korean Journal of Food And Nutrition
• /
• v.31 no.5
• /
• pp.616-630
• /
• 2018

This study analyzed the current status of registered patents related to food tech in Korea and Japan. Using the patent information search services of Korean and Japanese Patent Offices, patents registered during the past 10 years from January 1, 2005 to December 31, 2015 were searched with the following key words/phrases: "food or meal or diet" and "program or information system". A total of 669 patents (539 for Korea and 130 for Japan) were finally selected and analyzed. Based on Porter's value chain theory, the patents were categorized into three dimensions related to "manufacturing/processing/distribution", "sales & marketing", and "consumer support". The results showed that in Korea, 41.7% of the total patents were related to sales & marketing followed by consumer support (37.3%) and manufacturing/processing/distribution (21.0%). In Japan, patents related to consumer support accounted for 56.2% followed by manufacturing/processing/distribution (32.3%), and sales & marketing (11.5%). In the area of manufacturing/processing/distribution, "food quality management system" in Korea, and "food manufacturing and processing management system" and "food safety control and hazard analysis system" in Japan tended to show a significantly higher proportion of patents registered (p<.05). Under sales & marketing, patents in the categories of "food purchase and delivery service system" in Korea and "restaurant information sharing system" in Japan tended to be more frequently registered (p<.05). Finally, in the area of consumer support, "kitchen facility and cooking device control system" in Korea and "menu and nutrition management system" in Japan tended to account for a significantly higher proportion of patents registered (p<.001). The results are expected to provide useful insights into the development of new patents and markets for food tech in the future.

• KDI Journal of Economic Policy
• /
• v.32 no.4
• /
• pp.115-151
• /
• 2010

Recently Korean universities show very rapid increases in both patents and R&D (research and development) expenditures. During the period from 1970 to 2008, university R&D spending has on the average increased 15.3% annually. Along with steady increases in R&D spending, university's research outputs have also continuously increased. In 1990 Korea as a total published 1,613 SCI-level scientific papers and Korean universities applied 27 patents to Korea patent office. In 2008, Korea published more that 35,000 SCI papers and Korean universities applied about 7,300 patents. The growth of scientific articles had begun from the early 1990s whereas the growth of patent has ignited entering the 2000s. The paper tried to investigate university research through the window of patent. Patents lie between invention and innovation and represent the potential value of invention which will be realized at the marketplace. Since Korean patents do not contain citation information, the paper used US patents-NBER patent database-as the main data. The key empirical question is whether Korean university patents granted from USPTO are characteristically different from other Korean patents granted from USPTO. Previous studies on US and Europe show that corporate patents are more stylized in appropriablity of invention, whereas university patents basicness. In case of Korea, the paper confirmed the appropriability characteristic of corporate patents; but the Korean unversity patents are not distinguishable in terms of basicness. The paper estimated the citation frequency function-an empirical model which was firstly developed by Caballero and Jaffe (1993) and later articulated by Jaffe and Trajtenberg (1996, 2002). The model is specified mainly composed of two interacting parts-diffusion effect and obsolescence effect of new ideas or innovations. Estimation results show that differences in forward citations between university and corporate patents are not statistically significant, after controlling self-citation. Since forward citations represent the quality of patents, this estimation result implies that there are no statistically significant quality differences between university and corporate patents. Prior research results, based on the same model of citation frequency function, about US and some European cases show that, in terms of forward citations, university patents are generally superior to corporate patents -for the case of US- or, the former not inferior to the latter-for the case of most of Europe. It is argued that some important and significant policy changes caused the rapid rise of university patents in Korea. Policy changes include the revision of technology transfer act allowing the ownership of publicly-funded research results to researchers and the changes in faculty/professor evaluation which gives more credit to the number of patents. These policy changes have triggered the rapid growth of the number of university patents. The results of the empirical analysis in this paper indicated that Korea now needs to make further efforts to enhance the quality of university patents, not just to produce more numbers of patents.