Abstract
Many methods have been developed to recognize those progresses of technologies, and one of them is to analyze patent information. And visualization methods are considered to be proper for representing patent information and its analysis results. However, current visualization methods for patent analysis patent maps have some drawbacks. Therefore, we propose an alternative visualization method in this paper. With colleted keywords from patent documents of a target technology field, we cluster patent documents by the k-Means algorithm. With the clustering results, we form a semantic network of keywords without respect of filing dates. And then we build up a patent map by rearranging each keyword node of the semantic network according to its earliest filing date and frequency in patent documents. Our approach contributes to establishing a patent map which considers both structured and unstructured items of a patent document. Besides, differently from previous visualization methods for patent analysis, ours is based on forming a semantic network of keywords from patent documents. And thereby it visualizes a clear overview of patent information in a more comprehensible way. And as a result of those contributions, it enables us to understand advances of emerging technologies and forecast its trend in the future.
Keywords: Visualization; Patent analysis; k-Means clustering; Semantic network; Ubiquitous computing technology
A New Visualization Method for Patent Map: Application to Ubiquitous Computing Technology (sp)
Jong Hwan Suh1 and Sang Chan Park1, 2
Abstract
As technologies develop in faster and more complicated ways, it is getting more important to expect the direction of technological progresses. So many methods are being proposed all around world and one of them is to use patent information. Moreover, with efforts of governments in many countries, many patent analysis methods have been exploited and suggested usually on the basis of patent documents. However, current patent analysis methods have some limitations. In this paper, we suggest a new visualization method for a patent map, which represents patent analysis results with considering both structured and unstructured items of each patent document. And by the adoption of the k-means clustering algorithm and semantic networks, we suggest concrete steps to make a patent map which gives a clear and instinctive insight on the targeted technology. In application, we built up a patent map for the ubiquitous computing technology and discussed an overall view of its progresses.