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Recent Trends in Business-related Inventions

November 2022
Patent Examination Department (Electronic Technology),
Japan Patent Office

Contents

  1. Outline of Business-related invention
  2. Application Trends in Business-related inventions
  3. Reference Information about Business-related invention

1. Outline of Business-related invention

1-1. What is Business-related invention?

  • Business-related invention* is an invention in which business method is realized using Information and Communication Technology (ICT).
  • The patent system aims to contribute to the development of industry through the protection of technology. Therefore, an idea of itself cannot be eligible subject matter, even if it is a ground-breaking idea for sales management or production management.
  • On the other hand, an invention in which such idea is realized using ICT would be eligible subject matter as Business-related invention.

* We define the patent application classified into G06Q as IPC or FI as "Business-related invention". The definition of "Business-related invention" is used only in this research, and does not express an official definition from the Japan Patent Office.

(figure) Business method �~ ICT �~ Business related ingentions

1-2. Business-related invention in Fourth Industrial Revolution

  • With the progress of new technologies such as Internet of Things (IoT) or artificial intelligence (AI) promoting the Fourth Industrial Revolution, the utilization of Business-related invention is getting attention from the industry.
  • As an example of Business-related invention using IoT, consider a model consisting of the steps ① to ⑥ as follows; ① Collecting data from various sensors or devices, ② Transferring the collected data, ③ Storing the transferred data in the storage system as "Big Data", ④ Analyzing the stored data by using AI etc. and outputting new data, ⑤ Utilizing the output data to any service, ⑥ Establishing business model in IoT. In this model, the system embodying own company's business model can be protected as Business-related patents regarding ⑤ utilizing data and ⑥ establishing business model.

(figure) IoT Model

2. Application Trends in Business-related inventions

2-1. Overall Trends in Application and Examination

  • The number of domestic patent applications for Business-related invention has been characteristically transitioning (Graph 1). The downward trend after the application boom in 2000 turned to increase in around 2012 and 11,747 applications were filed in 2020.
  • This increase is assumed to be caused by the activation of R & D on the solution business following the industrial structure change from "products" to "services". Another reason is that new services using ICT are being created in new fields such as finance, due to development in AI and IoT technologies in addition to the spread of smartphones and SNS to the public.
  • The grant rate of business-related inventions was initially sluggish, but has been rising year by year (Graph 2), reaching 74% which is equivalent to other technical fields in 2017.

(Graph 1) The number of applications for Business-related invention
Graph 1 The number of applications for Business-related invention

(Graph 2) Grant rate for Business-related invention (for the applications of which main features are Business-related inventions)
Graph 2 Grant rate for Business-related invention
(for the applications of which main features are Business-related inventions)

Remarks

  • "Applications of which main features are business-related inventions " refers to an application classified into G06Q as main FI.
  • "Applications that are business-related inventions but have main features in other technical fields" refers to an application classified into G06Q as FI and also classified into other FIs as main FI.
  • The number of applications is the total number of (1) the number of domestic applications and (2) the number of international applications based on Patent Cooperation Treatment (PCT) and transferred into the national phase in Japan. The number includes undisclosed applications for which a decision of refusal, (deemed) withdrawal, or abandonment was made prior to publish.
  • The application date of PCT international applications is determined as the acceptance date of the domestic document.
  • Grant rate = number of decisions to grant a patent / (number of decisions to grant a patent + number of decisions of refusal + number of withdrawals or abandonment after FA)

2-2. Application Trends by Field

  • According to the number of business-related applications by field (Graph 3), the top three fields in 2020 are:
    • (1) Services in general (e.g. accommodation, restaurant, real estate, transportation and communication)
    • (2) Commerce (e.g. E-commerce, auction, market forecast and online advertisements)
    • (3) Administration; Management (e.g. in-house operation system, production management, inventory management, project management and staffing)
  • In the field of "Services in general", it is considered that the diversification of services provided on smartphones and online increased the number of applications. In particular, dispatch services such as taxi, vacation rental business and real estate tech diversify in transportation, accommodation and real estate, respectively and these are considered to be factors for the increase in the number of applications in this field.
  • The increasing number of applications for "Commerce" is considered to be due to the rise of e-commerce including flea market apps and online auctions, and the accompanying activation of marketing and advertising businesses.
  • A typical example of "Administration; Management" is an invention that utilizes AI to optimize in-house business systems and inventory management.
  • "Finance" including FinTech is also large next to the top three fields and the number of its applications has been increasing. In recent years, financial services that users can easily receive via smartphones have increased in the finance field (e.g. smartphone payment and household account app).
  • Although the number of applications related to primary and secondary industries is small, it has approximately tripled from 2014 to 2020 and it can be seen that problem solution using ICT has spread to a wide range of fields.

(Graph 3) The number of business-related applications by field
Graph 3 The number of business-related applications by field

Remarks

  • Graph 3 is made based on primary FI assigned to "Applications of which main features are Business-related inventions".
  • Correspondence between fields and FI and the number of applications for each year are as follows (see J-PlatPat ( External link ) for details of classification).
 
Industry Field Corresponding FI 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018 2019 2020
Services in general G06Q50/,90/,99/ other than the following 1,286 1,224 1,089 1,412 1,486 1,849 2,229
Commerce G06Q30/ 1,258 1,150 1,282 1,365 1,580 1,754 1,985
Administration; Management G06Q10/ 576 592 986 1,289 1,567 1,848 2,049
Finance G06Q20/,40/ 583 542 769 834 1,093 1,128 1,260
Secondary Industry (Manufacturing, Construction) G06Q50/04,50/08 115 135 151 171 185 256 342
Energy industry (Electricity, gas or water supply) G06Q50/06 153 178 258 170 229 242 255
Primary Industry (Agriculture; Fishing; Mining) G06Q50/02 42 35 59 96 77 151 158
Education G06Q50/20 56 62 75 86 91 83 111
Government or public services G06Q50/26 59 101 92 81 102 105 138

2-3. AI-related Invention and Business-related invention

  • Business-related inventions are highly compatible with AI (especially machine learning technology that makes decisions by learning data), and there are increasing cases of solving business problems by using AI.
  • It can be seen that the number of applications for AI-related inventions in the top four fields mentioned above in business-related inventions has been on the rise since 2015 (Graph 4). In particular, the number of "Commerce" has been increasing year by year, so it is thought that inventions of AI have been increasing, such that make a prediction about and optimize e-commerce and marketing based on purchase history data, etc.

(Graph 4) The number of applications for AI-related inventions by field
Graph 4 The number of applications for AI-related inventions by field

Remarks

Industry Field 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018 2019 2020
Administration; Management 17 6 20 60 119 123 118
Commerce 15 11 27 41 68 83 111
Services in general 18 14 17 31 46 115 101
Finance 0 3 10 20 31 35 40

2-4. Application Trends in Each Country

  • The number of applications for business-related inventions in each country is on the rise as a whole (Graph 5).
  • The number of applications in China is rapidly increasing, and it is 50,000 over in and after 2018.
  • The number of applications filed in the US had been on the decline since 2014, due to Alice decision* by Supreme Court in 2014, which made it difficult to obtain business-related patents in US, but increased in 2019. The increase is assumed to be caused by the revision of examination guidance in January 2019, which improved predictability of examination of business-related inventions.
  • The number of applications to the European Patent Office (EPO) is the lowest among the five major patent offices, probably due to strict judgment on inventive step for business-related inventions by the EPO.
  • * Alice Corp. v. CLS Bank International, 134 S. Ct.2347 (2014).

(Graph 5) The number of applications for business-related inventions in each country
Graph 5 The number of applications for business-related inventions in each country

Remarks

  • Graph 5 is made based on the applications classified into IPC: G06Q, regardless of whether it is a major classification.
  • For Japan, China, and Korea, the number of applications includes utility models.
  • Graph 5 is made based on WIPO Patentscope ( External link ) (searched on August 3, 2022). As the searched databases are different, the number of JP applications does not match the number of domestic applications in Graph 1.
  • The number of applications in each country is as follows.
 
2011 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018 2019
CN 4,570 5,920 8,653 11,146 17,021 29,056 40,811 52,218 58,491
US 11,804 15,268 17,825 19,026 17,309 16,682 17,294 16,696 19,494
KR 5,629 7,409 6,929 7,199 8,400 9,319 9,076 10,805 11,919
JP 4,980 5,634 6,125 6,456 6,128 7,016 7,831 7,890 9,148
EP 2,265 2,665 2,766 3,020 3,171 3,351 3,407 3,250 3,570
WO 3,409 4,656 4,792 5,044 6,036 6,449 6,739 7,812 7,886

3. Reference Information about Business-related invention

  1. Examination Handbook for Patent and Utility Model in Japan Annex B Chapter 1 Computer Software-Related Inventions (PDF : 2,131KB)
  2. Examination Guidelines pertinent to IoT related technologies
  3. Patent Examination Case Examples pertinent to AI-related technologies
  4. Recent Trends in AI-related Inventions
  5. Japanese Pages

[Last updated 9 December 2022]

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