Browsing by Author "Sihvonen, Jari"

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Teollisuusyritysten patenttitutkimustoiminta
(2010) Sihvonen, Jari
School of Engineering | Master's thesis
Patents provide a wide and comprehensive information source for technical inventions, a source which industrial companies should actively capitalize on in their business activities. The patent system seeks to ensure the development of society by granting the inventor the right to exclude others from making, using, selling, offering for sale or importing a patented invention. An invention must be described in sufficient detail in a patent publication for a person skilled in the relevant area of technology to make and use the invention. A patent application contains a written description of the invention, drawings and claims that are required for a patent to be granted. The claims consist of independent claims and dependent claims. Independent claims set out the scope of protection and a number of dependent claims which narrow that protection by defining more specific features of the invention. The purpose of this study is to define patent research process opportunities in industrial companies and then develop a documented novelty research process. The study also provides useful information about different kinds of patent research and patents. The theory part looks at patents and utility models and the requirements for obtaining a patent for an invention. The work examines the different kinds of patent research industrial companies carry out and shows how companies can utilize patent information for business purposes. Literature from the patent authorities of different countries and publications from various companies have been used as source material for the theory. The study includes interviews of persons responsible for patent matters in various industrial companies. These interviews are aimed at benchmarking, which can then be used to identify new practices for patent research activities. The study also includes a geographical analysis, which shows where specific companies patent their solutions. For the analysis, different products are grouped into high level product categories. At the end of study, there is a comparison between two different patent databases in the light of geographic coverage and novelty research.