IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/xrp/wpaper/xreap2011-03.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Singling out individual inventors from patent data

Author

Listed:
  • Ernest Miguélez

    (AQR-IREA. Department of Econometrics, Statistics and Spanish Economy. University of Barcelona, Av. Diagonal 690, 08034 Barcelona, Spain)

  • Ismael Gómez-Miguélez

    (Signal Theory and Communications Department. Technical University of Catalonia, c/ Jordi Girona 1-3, 08034 Barcelona, Spain.)

Abstract

An increasing number of studies have sprung up in recent years seeking to identify individual inventors from patent data. Different heuristics have been suggested to use their names and other information disclosed in patent documents in order to find out “who is who” in patents. This paper contributes to this literature by setting forth a methodology to identify them using patents applied to the European Patent Office (EPO hereafter). As in the large part of this literature, we basically follow a three-steps procedure: (1) the parsing stage, aimed at reducing the noise in the inventor’s name and other fields of the patent; (2) the matching stage, where name matching algorithms are used to group possible similar names; (3) the filtering stage, where additional information and different scoring schemes are used to filter out these potential same inventors. The paper includes some figures resulting of applying the algorithms to the set of European inventors applying to the EPO for a large period of time.

Suggested Citation

  • Ernest Miguélez & Ismael Gómez-Miguélez, 2011. "Singling out individual inventors from patent data," Working Papers XREAP2011-03, Xarxa de Referència en Economia Aplicada (XREAP), revised May 2011.
    • Handle: RePEc:xrp:wpaper:xreap2011-03
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.xreap.cat/RePEc/xrp/pdf/XREAP2011-03.pdf
    File Function: First version, 2011
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: http://www.xreap.cat/RePEc/xrp/pdf/XREAP2011-03.pdf
    File Function: Revised version, 2011
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Ajay Agrawal & Iain Cockburn & John McHale, 2003. "Gone But Not Forgotten: Labor Flows, Knowledge Spillovers, and Enduring Social Capital," NBER Working Papers 9950, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    2. Jinyoung Kim & Sangjoon John Lee & Gerald Marschke, 2009. "International Knowledge Flows: Evidence from an Inventor-Firm Matched Data Set," NBER Chapters, in: Science and Engineering Careers in the United States: An Analysis of Markets and Employment, pages 321-348, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    3. Manuel Trajtenberg & Gil Shiff & Ran Melamed, 2009. "The "Names Game": Harnessing Inventors, Patent Data for Economic Research," Annals of Economics and Statistics, GENES, issue 93-94, pages 67-77.
    4. Zvi Griliches, 1998. "Patent Statistics as Economic Indicators: A Survey," NBER Chapters, in: R&D and Productivity: The Econometric Evidence, pages 287-343, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    5. Raffo, Julio & Lhuillery, Stéphane, 2009. "How to play the "Names Game": Patent retrieval comparing different heuristics," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 38(10), pages 1617-1627, December.
    6. Bottazzi, Laura & Peri, Giovanni, 2003. "Innovation and spillovers in regions: Evidence from European patent data," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 47(4), pages 687-710, August.
    7. Nicolas CARAYOL & Lorenzo CASSI, 2009. "Who\'s Who in Patents. A Bayesian approach," Cahiers du GREThA (2007-2019) 2009-07, Groupe de Recherche en Economie Théorique et Appliquée (GREThA).
    8. Grid Thoma & Salvatore Torrisi, 2007. "Creating Powerful Indicators for Innovation Studies with Approximate Matching Algorithms. A test based on PATSTAT and Amadeus databases," KITeS Working Papers 211, KITeS, Centre for Knowledge, Internationalization and Technology Studies, Universita' Bocconi, Milano, Italy, revised Dec 2007.
    9. Lee Fleming & Charles King & Adam I. Juda, 2007. "Small Worlds and Regional Innovation," Organization Science, INFORMS, vol. 18(6), pages 938-954, December.
    10. Stéphane Maraut & Hélène Dernis & Colin Webb & Vincenzo Spiezia & Dominique Guellec, 2008. "The OECD REGPAT Database: A Presentation," OECD Science, Technology and Industry Working Papers 2008/2, OECD Publishing.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Ventura, Samuel L. & Nugent, Rebecca & Fuchs, Erica R.H., 2015. "Seeing the non-stars: (Some) sources of bias in past disambiguation approaches and a new public tool leveraging labeled records," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 44(9), pages 1672-1701.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Michele Pezzoni & Francesco Lissoni & Gianluca Tarasconi, 2014. "How to kill inventors: testing the Massacrator© algorithm for inventor disambiguation," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 101(1), pages 477-504, October.
    2. Ernest Miguélez & Rosina Moreno & Jordi Suriñach, 2010. "Inventors on the move: Tracing inventors' mobility and its spatial distribution," Papers in Regional Science, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 89(2), pages 251-274, June.
    3. Carayol, Nicolas & Bergé, Laurent & Cassi, Lorenzo & Roux, Pascale, 2019. "Unintended triadic closure in social networks: The strategic formation of research collaborations between French inventors," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 163(C), pages 218-238.
    4. Roberta Piergiovanni & Enrico Santarelli, 2013. "The more you spend, the more you get? The effects of R&D and capital expenditures on the patenting activities of biotechnology firms," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 94(2), pages 497-521, February.
    5. Miguélez, Ernest & Moreno, Rosina, 2015. "Knowledge flows and the absorptive capacity of regions," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 44(4), pages 833-848.
    6. Ernest Miguélez & Rosina Moreno, 2013. "“Mobility, networks and innovation: The role of regions’ absorptive capacity”," IREA Working Papers 201316, University of Barcelona, Research Institute of Applied Economics, revised Oct 2013.
    7. Massimiliano Ferrara & Roberto Mavilia & Bruno Antonio Pansera, 2017. "Extracting knowledge patterns with a social network analysis approach: an alternative methodology for assessing the impact of power inventors," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 113(3), pages 1593-1625, December.
    8. Ernest Miguélez & Rosina Moreno, 2013. "Do Labour Mobility and Technological Collaborations Foster Geographical Knowledge Diffusion? The Case of European Regions," Growth and Change, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 44(2), pages 321-354, June.
    9. Deyun Yin & Kazuyuki Motohashi & Jianwei Dang, 2020. "Large-scale name disambiguation of Chinese patent inventors (1985–2016)," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 122(2), pages 765-790, February.
    10. Jung, Taehyun & Ejermo, Olof, 2014. "Demographic patterns and trends in patenting: Gender, age, and education of inventors," Technological Forecasting and Social Change, Elsevier, vol. 86(C), pages 110-124.
    11. Favaro, Donata & Ninka, Eniel & Turvani, Margherita, 2012. "Productivity in innovation: the role of inventor connections and mobility," MPRA Paper 38950, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    12. Christ, Julian P., 2009. "The geography and co-location of European technology-specific co-inventorship networks," Violette Reihe: Schriftenreihe des Promotionsschwerpunkts "Globalisierung und Beschäftigung" 31/2010, University of Hohenheim, Carl von Ossietzky University Oldenburg, Evangelisches Studienwerk.
    13. Li, Guan-Cheng & Lai, Ronald & D’Amour, Alexander & Doolin, David M. & Sun, Ye & Torvik, Vetle I. & Yu, Amy Z. & Fleming, Lee, 2014. "Disambiguation and co-authorship networks of the U.S. patent inventor database (1975–2010)," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 43(6), pages 941-955.
    14. Zi‐Lin He & Tony W. Tong & Yuchen Zhang & Wenlong He, 2018. "Constructing a Chinese Patent Database of listed firms in China: Descriptions, lessons, and insights," Journal of Economics & Management Strategy, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 27(3), pages 579-606, September.
    15. Carlo Giglio & Roberto Sbragia & Roberto Musmanno & Roberto Palmieri, 2021. "Cross-country learning from patents: an analysis of citations flows in innovation trajectories," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 126(9), pages 7917-7936, September.
    16. Miguelez, Ernest, 2019. "Collaborative patents and the mobility of knowledge workers," Technovation, Elsevier, vol. 86, pages 62-74.
    17. Ventura, Samuel L. & Nugent, Rebecca & Fuchs, Erica R.H., 2015. "Seeing the non-stars: (Some) sources of bias in past disambiguation approaches and a new public tool leveraging labeled records," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 44(9), pages 1672-1701.
    18. Tsouchnika, Maria & Smolyak, Alex & Argyrakis, Panos & Havlin, Shlomo, 2022. "Patent collaborations: From segregation to globalization," Journal of Informetrics, Elsevier, vol. 16(1).
    19. Ernest Miguele & Rosina Moreno, 2012. "Do labour mobility and networks foster geographical knowledge diffusion? The case of European regions," Working Papers XREAP2012-14, Xarxa de Referència en Economia Aplicada (XREAP), revised Jul 2012.
    20. Favaro, Donata & Ninka, Eniel & Turvani, Margherita, 2014. "Knowledge externalities and knowledge creation: the role of inventors’ working relationships and mobility," MPRA Paper 64527, University Library of Munich, Germany.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    “Names game”; patent data; unique inventors; name matching algorithms;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • C8 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Data Collection and Data Estimation Methodology; Computer Programs
    • J61 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Mobility, Unemployment, Vacancies, and Immigrant Workers - - - Geographic Labor Mobility; Immigrant Workers
    • O31 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Innovation; Research and Development; Technological Change; Intellectual Property Rights - - - Innovation and Invention: Processes and Incentives
    • O33 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Innovation; Research and Development; Technological Change; Intellectual Property Rights - - - Technological Change: Choices and Consequences; Diffusion Processes
    • R0 - Urban, Rural, Regional, Real Estate, and Transportation Economics - - General

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:xrp:wpaper:xreap2011-03. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: XREAP (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/xreapes.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.