3. IP bundles

Did you know?

Korea’ IP portfolio is mostly made of ICT-related assets with patents (57%), trademarks (up to 65%) and designs (up to 62%).

Competing in Information and Communication Technology (ICT) markets worldwide requires innovations and technological developments to be bundled with appealing designs, while making consumers able to recognise the new and often complex products on offer.

Over 2012-15, ICT patents accounted for about 34% of all IP5 patent families filed by OECD countries - almost the same share observed a decade earlier. In contrast, China increased its share by 40% and its IP5 patent portfolio became the most specialised in ICT.

In the decade leading to 2015, for OECD countries the look and feel of ICT products protected through designs grew in importance in the United States (+14%) and the European markets (+9%), and decreased in Japan (-32%). Similarly, BRIICS economies tripled the share of ICT design patents filed in the United States, increased by more than 60% the share of ICT designs registered in Europe, and decreased by about 17% the share in Japan.

The share of ICT-related trademarks conversely grew in all markets considered, with the highest share observed in 2012-15 on the European market (+35%), followed by the Japanese (+27%) and the United States’ (+21%) markets.

Overall, OECD countries seem to progressively move towards ICT IP bundle strategies which put less emphasis on technological innovation and leverage more on the look and feel of products and on extracting value from branding. Conversely BRIICS countries are seemingly pursuing technological catch-up strategies, while ring-fencing their products through designs and brands.

Definitions

Patents protect technological inventions, i.e. products or processes providing new ways of doing something or new technological solutions to problems. IP5 patent families are patents within the Five IP offices (IP5). Patents in ICT are identified using the International Patent Classification (IPC) codes (see Inaba and Squicciarini, 2017). Designs protect new and/or original shapes, configurations or ornament aspects of products. Trademarks are distinctive signs, e.g. words and symbols, used to identify the goods or services of a firm from those of its competitors. ICT-related designs and trademarks are identified following an experimental OECD approach based on the Locarno and Nice Classifications, respectively, and combine a normative approach with the use of ICT-related keywords.

Measurability

Intellectual property (IP) rights follow a territoriality principle. Patents, designs and trademarks are protected only in the countries where they are registered. Using information on the priority date of patents, i.e. the date of the first filing of a patent whose protection has subsequently been extended to other IP jurisdictions, allows reconstructing patent families and avoiding duplications when counting IP assets. The same cannot be done for trademarks and designs, as information about identical registrations happened elsewhere is seldom available, if ever provided. In the United States designs are protected through design patents (at the United States Patents and Trademark Office, USPTO), whereas in Europe (at the European Union Intellectual Property Office, EUIPO) and in Japan (at the Japan Patent Office, JPO) design is protected through registration of industrial designs. As opposed to the case of patents, data availability constraints do not allow reconstructing design and trademark portfolios protected at the IP5 offices. The definition of ICT patents in Inaba and Squicciarini (2017) aligns with the OECD definitions of the ICT sector (2007) and of ICT products (2008).