IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/bla/jemstr/v32y2023i1p132-157.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Truly standard‐essential patents? A semantics‐based analysis

Author

Listed:
  • Lorenz Brachtendorf
  • Fabian Gaessler
  • Dietmar Harhoff

Abstract

Standard‐essential patents (SEPs) have become a key element of technical coordination via standard‐setting organizations. Yet, in many cases, it remains unclear whether a declared SEP is truly standard‐essential. To date, there is no automated procedure that allows for a scalable and objective assessment of SEP status. This paper introduces a semantics‐based method for approximating the standard essentiality of patents. We provide details on the procedure that generates the measure of standard essentiality and present the results of several validation and robustness exercises. We illustrate the measure's usefulness in estimating the share of true SEPs in firm patent portfolios for several telecommunication standards.

Suggested Citation

  • Lorenz Brachtendorf & Fabian Gaessler & Dietmar Harhoff, 2023. "Truly standard‐essential patents? A semantics‐based analysis," Journal of Economics & Management Strategy, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 32(1), pages 132-157, January.
    • Handle: RePEc:bla:jemstr:v:32:y:2023:i:1:p:132-157
    DOI: 10.1111/jems.12500
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://doi.org/10.1111/jems.12500
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1111/jems.12500?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Bekkers, Rudi & Martinelli, Arianna & Tamagni, Federico, 2020. "The impact of including standards-related documentation in patent prior art: Evidence from an EPO policy change," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 49(7).
    2. Bekkers, Rudi & Catalini, Christian & Martinelli, Arianna & Righi, Cesare & Simcoe, Timothy, 2023. "Disclosure rules and declared essential patents," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 52(1).
    3. Charles A. W. deGrazia & Jesse P. Frumkin & Nicholas A. Pairolero, 2020. "Embracing invention similarity for the measurement of vertically overlapping claims," Economics of Innovation and New Technology, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 29(2), pages 113-146, February.
    4. Daniel F Spulber, 2019. "Standard Setting Organisations and Standard Essential Patents: Voting and Markets," The Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 129(619), pages 1477-1509.
    5. deGrazia, Charles A.W. & Pairolero, Nicholas A. & Teodorescu, Mike H.M., 2021. "Examination incentives, learning, and patent office outcomes: The use of examiner’s amendments at the USPTO," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 50(10).
    6. Josh Lerner & Jean Tirole, 2015. "Standard-Essential Patents," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 123(3), pages 547-586.
    7. Carl Shapiro, 2001. "Navigating the Patent Thicket: Cross Licenses, Patent Pools, and Standard Setting," NBER Chapters, in: Innovation Policy and the Economy, Volume 1, pages 119-150, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    8. Sam Arts & Bruno Cassiman & Juan Carlos Gomez, 2018. "Text matching to measure patent similarity," Strategic Management Journal, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 39(1), pages 62-84, January.
    9. Bryan Kelly & Dimitris Papanikolaou & Amit Seru & Matt Taddy, 2021. "Measuring Technological Innovation over the Long Run," American Economic Review: Insights, American Economic Association, vol. 3(3), pages 303-320, September.
    10. Duen-Ren Liu & Meng-Jung Shih, 2011. "Hybrid-patent classification based on patent-network analysis," Journal of the Association for Information Science & Technology, Association for Information Science & Technology, vol. 62(2), pages 246-256, February.
    11. Benjamin Chiao & Josh Lerner & Jean Tirole, 2007. "The rules of standard-setting organizations: an empirical analysis," RAND Journal of Economics, RAND Corporation, vol. 38(4), pages 905-930, December.
    12. Bekkers, Rudi & Bongard, René & Nuvolari, Alessandro, 2011. "An empirical study on the determinants of essential patent claims in compatibility standards," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 40(7), pages 1001-1015, September.
    13. Timothy S. Simcoe & Stuart J.H. Graham & Maryann P. Feldman, 2009. "Competing on Standards? Entrepreneurship, Intellectual Property, and Platform Technologies," Journal of Economics & Management Strategy, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 18(3), pages 775-816, September.
    14. Marc Rysman & Timothy Simcoe, 2008. "Patents and the Performance of Voluntary Standard-Setting Organizations," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 54(11), pages 1920-1934, November.
    15. Alfonso Gambardella & Dietmar Harhoff & Bart Verspagen, 2017. "The economic value of patent portfolios," Journal of Economics & Management Strategy, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 26(4), pages 735-756, December.
    16. Jeffrey M. Kuhn & Neil C. Thompson, 2019. "How to Measure and Draw Causal Inferences with Patent Scope," International Journal of the Economics of Business, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 26(1), pages 5-38, January.
    17. Justus Baron & Jorge Contreras & Martin Husovec & Pierre Larouche, 2019. "Making the Rules: The Governance of Standard Development Organizations and their Policies on Intellectual Property Rights," JRC Research Reports JRC115004, Joint Research Centre.
    18. Josh Lerner & Haris Tabakovic & Jean Tirole, 2016. "Patent Disclosures and Standard-Setting," NBER Working Papers 22768, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    19. Kang, Byeongwoo & Motohashi, Kazuyuki, 2015. "Essential intellectual property rights and inventors’ involvement in standardization," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 44(2), pages 483-492.
    20. Mathias Dewatripont & Patrick Legros, 2013. "‘Essential’ Patents, FRAND Royalties and Technological Standards," Journal of Industrial Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 61(4), pages 913-937, December.
    21. Katrin Hussinger & Franz Schwiebacher, 2015. "The Market Value of Technology Disclosures to Standard Setting Organizations," Industry and Innovation, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 22(4), pages 321-344, May.
    22. Omachi, Masayoshi & 大町, 真義, 2004. "Emergence of Essential Patents in Technical Standards: Implications of the Continuation and Divisional Application Systems and the Written Description Requirement," IIR Working Paper 05-02, Institute of Innovation Research, Hitotsubashi University.
    23. Daniel Quint, 2014. "Pooling with Essential and Nonessential Patents," American Economic Journal: Microeconomics, American Economic Association, vol. 6(1), pages 23-57, February.
    24. Justus Baron & Tim Pohlmann, 2018. "Mapping standards to patents using declarations of standard‐essential patents," Journal of Economics & Management Strategy, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 27(3), pages 504-534, September.
    25. Jan M. Gerken & Martin G. Moehrle, 2012. "A new instrument for technology monitoring: novelty in patents measured by semantic patent analysis," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 91(3), pages 645-670, June.
    26. Ryan Whalen & Alina Lungeanu & Leslie DeChurch & Noshir Contractor, 2020. "Patent Similarity Data and Innovation Metrics," Journal of Empirical Legal Studies, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 17(3), pages 615-639, September.
    27. Berger, Florian & Blind, Knut & Thumm, Nikolaus, 2012. "Filing behaviour regarding essential patents in industry standards," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 41(1), pages 216-225.
    28. Justus Baron & Daniel F. Spulber, 2018. "Technology Standards and Standard Setting Organizations: Introduction to the Searle Center Database," Journal of Economics & Management Strategy, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 27(3), pages 462-503, September.
    29. Gątkowski, Mateusz & Dietl, Marek & Skrok, Łukasz & Whalen, Ryan & Rockett, Katharine, 2020. "Semantically-based patent thicket identification," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 49(2).
    30. Kang, Byeongwoo & Bekkers, Rudi, 2015. "Just-in-time patents and the development of standards," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 44(10), pages 1948-1961.
    31. Carl Shapiro, 2001. "Navigating the Patent Thicket: Cross Licenses, Patent Pools, and Standard Setting," NBER Chapters, in: Innovation Policy and the Economy, Volume 1, pages 119-150, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    32. Aija Elina Leiponen, 2008. "Competing Through Cooperation: The Organization of Standard Setting in Wireless Telecommunications," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 54(11), pages 1904-1919, November.
    33. Bekkers, Rudi & Tur, Elena M. & Henkel, Joachim & van der Vorst, Tommy & Driesse, Menno & Contreras, Jorge L., 2022. "Overcoming inefficiencies in patent licensing: A method to assess patent essentiality for technical standards," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 51(10).
    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. Armin Mertens & Marc Scheufen, 2024. "Intellectual property and fourth industrial revolution technologies: how the patent system is shaping the future in the data-driven economy," European Journal of Law and Economics, Springer, vol. 57(1), pages 275-310, April.
    2. Xu, Haiyun & Yue, Zenghui & Pang, Hongshen & Elahi, Ehsan & Li, Jing & Wang, Lu, 2022. "Integrative model for discovering linked topics in science and technology," Journal of Informetrics, Elsevier, vol. 16(2).
    3. Love, Brian J. & Helmers, Christian, 2023. "Patent hold-out and licensing frictions: Evidence from litigation of standard essential patents," International Journal of Industrial Organization, Elsevier, vol. 89(C).
    4. Valentin J. Schmitt, 2025. "Disentangling patent quality: using a large language model for a systematic literature review," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 130(1), pages 267-311, January.
    5. Arts, Sam & Hou, Jianan & Gomez, Juan Carlos, 2021. "Natural language processing to identify the creation and impact of new technologies in patent text: Code, data, and new measures," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 50(2).
    6. Bekkers, Rudi & Tur, Elena M. & Henkel, Joachim & van der Vorst, Tommy & Driesse, Menno & Contreras, Jorge L., 2022. "Overcoming inefficiencies in patent licensing: A method to assess patent essentiality for technical standards," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 51(10).
    7. Parcu, Pier Luigi & Pisarkiewicz, Anna Renata & Carrozza, Chiara & Innocenti, Niccolò, 2023. "The future of 5G and beyond: Leadership, deployment and European policies," Telecommunications Policy, Elsevier, vol. 47(9).

    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. Justus Baron & Tim Pohlmann, 2018. "Mapping standards to patents using declarations of standard‐essential patents," Journal of Economics & Management Strategy, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 27(3), pages 504-534, September.
    2. Cesare Righi & Timothy Simcoe, 2022. "Patenting inventions or inventing patents? Continuation practice at the USPTO," Economics Working Papers 1820, Department of Economics and Business, Universitat Pompeu Fabra.
    3. Timothy Simcoe & Cesare Righi, 2022. "Patenting Inventions or Inventing Patents? Continuation Practice at the USPTO," Working Papers 1320, Barcelona School of Economics.
    4. Baron, Justus, 2020. "Counting standard contributions to measure the value of patent portfolios - A tale of apples and oranges," Telecommunications Policy, Elsevier, vol. 44(3).
    5. Cesare Righi & Timothy Simcoe, 2020. "Patenting Inventions or Inventing Patents? Continuation Practice at the USPTO," NBER Working Papers 27686, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    6. Justus Baron & Cher Li & Shukhrat Nasirov, 2019. "Why do R&D-intensive firms participate in standards organizations? The role of patents and product-market position," Discussion Papers 2019-16, University of Nottingham, GEP.
    7. Justus Baron & Jorge Contreras & Martin Husovec & Pierre Larouche, 2019. "Making the Rules: The Governance of Standard Development Organizations and their Policies on Intellectual Property Rights," JRC Research Reports JRC115004, Joint Research Centre.
    8. Gamarra, Yanis & Friedl, Gunther, 2022. "Firms' Involvement in Standardization and Average Total Costs per Patent Family," 31st European Regional ITS Conference, Gothenburg 2022: Reining in Digital Platforms? Challenging monopolies, promoting competition and developing regulatory regimes 265630, International Telecommunications Society (ITS).
    9. Gamarra, Yanis Luca & Friedl, Gunther, 2023. "Declared essential patents and average total R&D expenditures per patent family," Telecommunications Policy, Elsevier, vol. 47(7).
    10. Fu, Xiao & Tan, Guofu & Wang, Jin, 2023. "Policy orientations and technology choices in standards wars," International Journal of Industrial Organization, Elsevier, vol. 88(C).
    11. Kang, Byeongwoo & Bekkers, Rudi, 2015. "Just-in-time patents and the development of standards," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 44(10), pages 1948-1961.
    12. Righi, Cesare & Cannito, Davide & Vladasel, Theodor, 2023. "Continuing patent applications at the USPTO," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 52(4).
    13. Justus Baron & Kirti Gupta, 2018. "Unpacking 3GPP standards," Journal of Economics & Management Strategy, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 27(3), pages 433-461, September.
    14. Yao, Li & Li, Jun & Chen, Kaihua & Yu, Rongjian, 2024. "Winning the second race of technology standardization: Strategic maneuvers in SEP follow-on innovations," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 53(6).
    15. Kim, Dong-hyu, 2022. "Effects of catch-up and incumbent firms’ SEP strategic manoeuvres," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 51(5).
    16. Byeongwoo Kang & Rudi Bekkers, 2013. "Just-in-time inventions and the development of standards: How firms use opportunistic strategies to obtain standard-essential patents (SEPs)," Working Papers 13-01, Eindhoven Center for Innovation Studies, revised Feb 2013.
    17. Kang, Byeongwoo & Bekkers, Rudi, 2022. "The determinants of parallel invention : Measuring the role of information sharing and personal interaction between inventors," IIR Working Paper 22-06, Institute of Innovation Research, Hitotsubashi University.
    18. Bekkers, Rudi & Catalini, Christian & Martinelli, Arianna & Righi, Cesare & Simcoe, Timothy, 2023. "Disclosure rules and declared essential patents," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 52(1).
    19. DANG, Jianwei & KANG, Byeongwoo & DING, Ke, 2016. "Landscape of standard essential patents : The case of East Asian countries," IIR Working Paper 16-12, Institute of Innovation Research, Hitotsubashi University.
    20. Kang, Byeongwoo & Bekkers, Rudi & Ohyama, Atsushi, 2024. "The determinants of parallel invention: Measuring the role of information sharing and personal interaction between inventors," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 53(10).

    More about this item

    JEL classification:

    • L24 - Industrial Organization - - Firm Objectives, Organization, and Behavior - - - Contracting Out; Joint Ventures
    • O33 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Innovation; Research and Development; Technological Change; Intellectual Property Rights - - - Technological Change: Choices and Consequences; Diffusion Processes
    • O34 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Innovation; Research and Development; Technological Change; Intellectual Property Rights - - - Intellectual Property and Intellectual Capital

    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:bla:jemstr:v:32:y:2023:i:1:p:132-157. 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: Wiley Content Delivery (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.kellogg.northwestern.edu/research/journals/JEMS/ .

    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.