Industrial challenges in patent management and crowdsourcing patent landscapes for engineering design innovation

Innovation is critical to sustain in prevailing competitive business environments. Industries need effective innovation strategies in-practice to develop and deliver novel products and services swiftly. In order to implement innovation strategies effectively, industries need innovation capacity in engineering design supported with intellectual assets. However, there are many issues that prevent streamlining these processes. The objectives of this research are to explicit the issues related to industrial patents (one of the important resources in intellectual assets) generation and management processes, and propose cost-effective crowdsourcing approach as a tool for patent landscaping activities. Interviews with patent attorneys and intellectual audit specialists reveal that most industries have ineffective intellectual property strategy; engineers do little patent searching, face challenges to identify novel product features, and often find difficulties to interpret patent information. The initial experiments of using the crowdsourcing approach for patent clustering activity reveal that general crowd workers (not knowing much about patents) were able to identify one third of expert clustered schema for much lesser cost. Further research work to strengthen the usefulness of the crowdsourcing approach for patent landscaping related activities is discussed

The analysis and presentation of patents to support engineering design

This paper explores the role of patents in engineering design, and how the extraction and presentation of patent data could be improved for designers. We propose the use of crowdsourcing as a means to post tasks online for a crowd of people to participate and complete. The is-sues of assessment, searching, clustering and knowledge transfer are evaluated with respect to the literature. Opportunities for potential crowd intervention are then discussed, before the presentation of two initial studies. These related to the categorization and interpretation of patents respectively using an online platform. The initial results establish basic crowd capabilities in understanding patent text and interpreting patent drawings. This has shown that reasonable results can be achieved if tasks of appropriate duration and complexity are set, and if test questions are incorporated to ensure a basic level of understanding exists in the workers

Método e repositório BIOsign : sistematização biomimética para aplicação dos princípios de solução da natureza no processo de desenvolvimento de produtos

No contexto do processo de desenvolvimento de produto, a etapa conceitual comporta o uso de diferentes métodos criativos, dentre os quais, a analogia com a natureza, ou biomimética. A biologia, por sua vez, oferece um extenso campo de informações potenciais, as quais, se sistematizadas, podem facilitar o acesso aos seus princípios de solução para aplicação no projeto de produto. A partir da investigação aprofundada da literatura sobre os métodos bio-inspirados existentes, foram identificadas as suas lacunas e pontos fracos, culminando com uma lista de requisitos a serem atendidos. A metodologia proposta para o desenvolvimento da pesquisa foi a Design Science Research, cuja abordagem é orientada ao desenvolvimento de projetos de artefatos, pois tem como objetivo prescrever e desenvolver conhecimentos para a concepção e elaboração de sistemas com foco em solucionar problemas. A partir do conhecimento gerado ao longo do trabalho, foi possível projetar e desenvolver os artefatos: um artefato-método e um artefato-instanciação, denominados Método e Repositório BIOsign, respectivamente. Os artefatos propostos estimulam e facilitam o uso dos princípios de solução da natureza na concepção de novos produtos, reduzindo o tempo e o esforço dos projetistas em assimilar e transpor as soluções naturais para os sistemas técnicos. Através do processo de decomposição funcional e da analogia com a natureza, o método BIOsign propõe o exercício de abstração, o que tende a minimizar as barreiras à criatividade, possibilitando a geração de soluções alternativas inovadoras. Por outro lado, a sistematização através do uso de um banco de dados de princípios de solução (Repositório BIOsign), tende a reduzir a subjetividade e a imprecisão na busca pelo conhecimento dos sistemas naturais. A quantidade e detalhamento das informações contidas no repositório faz dele uma ferramenta ampla e robusta, capaz de conduzir os usuários a soluções de projeto mais precisas. Os resultados obtidos com o desenvolvimento dos artefatos indicam que o objetivo geral foi atingido, pois, conforme apurado no processo de avaliação, os mesmos satisfazem as necessidades de projeto e os requisitos dos usuários.In the context of the Product Development Process, the conceptual stage involves the use of different creative methods, among which, the analogy with nature, or biomimetics. Biology, in turn, offers an extensive field of potential information, which, if systematized, can facilitate access to its solution principles for application in product design. From the in-depth investigation of the literature on existing bio-inspired methods, their gaps and weaknesses were identified, culminating in a list of requirements. The proposed methodology for the development of the research was Design Science Research, whose approach is oriented to the development of artifact projects, as it aims to prescribe and develop knowledge for the conception and elaboration of systems focused on solving problems. From the knowledge generated throughout the research, it was possible to design and develop the artifacts: an artifact-method and an artifact-instantiation, called BIOsign Method and Repository, respectively. The proposed artifacts stimulate and facilitate the use of nature's solution principles in the design of new products, reducing the time and effort of designers to assimilate and “translate” natural solutions into technical systems. Through the functional decomposition process and the analogy with nature, the BIOsign method proposes the exercise of abstraction, which minimizes barriers to creativity, enabling the generation of innovative alternative solutions. On the other hand, the systematization through the use of a filled of solution principles database (BIOsign Repository), minimizes subjectivity and imprecision in the search for knowledge of natural systems. The amount and detail of the information contained in the repository makes it a broad and robust tool, capable of leading users to more qualified design solutions. The results obtained with the development of the artifacts indicate that the general objective was achieved, because, as determined in the evaluation process, they satisfy the design needs and the requirements of the users