USE OF PATENT LITERATURE -CASE STUDY IN DOCUMENT PROCUREMENT ~ERVICE OF INSDOC

R S YadavVed Bhushan

The inlportance of patent as a source of information,Its volume and dUliculties of acqulslUon are discus-sed. The use of patents by Indian scientists as seenthrough requests made on In.doc'. document pro-curement service is analysed and diBcus.ed.

INTRODUCTION

The eccno mic future of a country dependsin the long run upon the inventi vene ss , manu-facturing skill, hardwork and enterprise of itspeople. The development of these qualitieshas been fostered in every country by confer-ring special right and giving incentives to menof genius. Even countries like Russia andHolland who once abandoned this tradition[v iz . Patent System) had to reinstitute it tofurthe r the' cause of technological innovation.When the patent is eventually granted by theState, th~ individual inventor is pre sented with'letters patents' - a contract which confers onhim the right to restrain othe r people fromusing his invention without his consent for alimited period [2). This period is sixteenyears in India, while in other countries itvaries from 12-20years.

1, I Definition

Patent is a government document thatcontains a detailed desc ription of new deviceor method of production followed by certainclaim~ made on the part of the inventor [1],A successful patent application must have thefollowing requi rements:

(i) Novelty

(i l) 'Inventiveness' or as it is usuallycalled patentable subject matter (3)

(i ii] Inventive usefulness

(i v] The patent specification itself isadequate or to use legal term,'5 ufficient'.

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Insdoc , New De1hi-12

1. ~ Natu re and Significance

Since patents embody the new inventionsthese are obviously the true index of technolo-gical advancement. The growth rate of patentliterature reveals the rapid pace at whichthe world is advancing on technological front.An estimate [4] in 1955 gave the number ofpatents the world over as 7 million (7 x 106)which was only 1. 2 million in 1900. Houghtonin this book "Technical Information Source S"

reports that on an average 120,000 basicpatents (0.34 million, including parallelpatents with an assumption that one specifica-tion is applied in three countries for grant ofpatent) are granted per year. If on an ~v~rage0.2 million (which is presently 0.34 m1111on)was the growth rate; the figure over theyear 1955-72 should have 'increased by 3.6million averaging a total estimate atnearly 11 millions. 'As a corollary, wemay note that patents can help in determin-ing the degree of technological developmentsof a nation. For example U, S. A. is leading theworld in the publication of patent specifications(80, 000 pe r yea r). U, K. and France follownext each with 40,000 patent spec Hi cations.Japan issues 28,000 specifications a year,Canada ?5, ODD, Germany (FDR) 21, ODD, Indianearly 5,000 a year. The figures reflect apositive correlation between the patentedinventions of a nation and the degree ofmaterial advancement. Various institutionsengaged in patent documentation keep theirscientists and engineers informed through suchsources of information, as:

The original specifications

~ Official patent office publications, e. g.the Gazette of India - Pt III Sec. 2.

3, Patent digests and lists e . g. Dovle sdigest of patents relating to coalt a rdyes and compounds, mainly based

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YADAV & VED BHUSH.AN

U:I ~~rrman patents. In India we havethe pub lica ti on (in two v c.lurries ]"Patented inventions of c. S. 1. R. ",arranged in numerical o r der .

Sc ient i fic & technical journals

5 Pedodicals devoted to patents only.Periodical publications havinginternational cove rage like 'Re sea rch,patents and trademar ks', 1947 -(previously known as "The Inter-national Bulletin of Jndu st rialProperty"j.

Court records e.g. U.S. SupremeCourt reports for patent, copyrightand trade mark cases.

7 Miscellaneous

Patent specifications are a basic sourceof sc ient if ic and technical info rmation; some-t irrre s th.,y conet itu;e the only source of newp ro c es s e s .

The unique advantage of patent informa-tion ove r other aou rce s of information is thatit prov ides a apec iIic solution resulting froman invent ion Cor a pa rticular technologicalproblems whereas a.a article in a journal or are search report must be laboriously filteredfor what is essential and' non-essential, usefuland .super-Floua befo r e a sclentlst or engineercan discover the authors main idea and apply1t for h1s own purpose [5,6].

Ideas disclosed in one process can crossCf" r t i lize developments in a cornple te l y diffe rentfie ld.

They help in, maintaining the spirit ofcornpe t it ivene se thus inc reasing technicalrefinement among different nations and questfo r flourishing climate in industries. Forexarnpl e , Dr. Robert Goddar's patents inroc ket.ry were unsuccessful in U. s. (11 butGermans came up with their rocket V-2 withthe "Arne patent. This i. furthe r evident froma U.N. survey [7) '\Whichconcluded that apat ent is more easily exploited in advancec.)untries •.s compared to deve luplng countries.

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1. 3 Object of the Study

Pate nt s have some Inher ent difflcultu,essuch as patents terminology, patents p:rocedure,l"";:;~uge Darrier and the restriction or useitself which retard the usefulness of patentsinformation. This is reflected in the study"Survey of Information Needs of Physicsts andChe mt s ts" made by A. Aims & Pro£. B. H.Flowers on behalf of Advisory Council ofSdentiflc Policy [8). One would agree withNewman [10] who maintains that sdentiste ,andengineers can hardly ignore the immense wealtbof inCormation stored in patent literature part'i-cularly in the field of chemical t;e chnologyand electrical engineering. This is quite inevidence from the rich collecUon of U. S.Patent Office, Washington.

In spite of being such an invaluable ~Ilourceof i:nforrnntion, the potentlallties of patentsliterature as a source of sdentiilc and tcchnl.cal information are under.rated. The broadobjective of this study is

(1) 'to assess the present status of patentIite eatu re from the point of patent literaturefrom the point of view of uae r s viz. scientlstlJ,engineers and industrial units etc;

(H) to point out countrywise standing ofthe various patent specifications in our usersl

pattern;

(ili) to assess the comparative use ofpatents made by government sponsored institu-tions and Induat r ia l Jccrsrme ec ia'l establish-rnent a: and

(Lv) to predict the cui-r-ent trends In,,users I pattern. \_

2 METHODOLOGY

The study has been carried out withblthe' traditional and accepted framework ofcase study method. The source of the datacol.lected has been the requisition orders £01'

patents regist ered at Documedt ProcurementSection of INSDOC during the past four fiscalyears K, L, M and N which stand for therespective years 1968-69, 1969-70, 1970-71,and 1971-12.

Mt attempt has been made to categort..the users into four groupa somewhat on theline of Asllb survey [91 in order to know whatand where the use of patent information canget ••.s , The ae groups are:

USE OF PATENT LITERATURE

A Government Departments/Universities

B Industries/Commercial firms/Manufacture rs

C Individual users

D Foreigners.

Institutions such as Engineers India Ltd. ,Mineral and Metal Trading Corporation,NationalCoal Development Corporation, etc. havebeen grouped under category 'A', as these areGovernment sponsored undertakings. Only therequisition orde rs complete in all re spectswere counted. The data have been tabulated insuch a way as to yield the expect ed resultsand materialize the object in view. Germanpatents include both FDR and GDR, as no hintor distinction has been made by the us er s inthis matter. Patents counted under the column'Nordic Countries' refer to patents of Norway,Denmark, Finland and Sweden. Patents notcove red unde r columns 1-8 a reolisted incolumn 9 under the category of other countries.

3 ANALYSIS

Total requests registered for all types ofservices (viz. microfilms, photocopies andtranslations) during the last four fiscal yearsK, L, M and N was 79486 of which as low as4494 have been for patent specifications.Yearwise breakdown is given in T'able 1 withmaximum requests for patents in 1971-72.Such a low figure as 5.6510 reveals thatpatents are perhaps among the most under-rated sources of information in the field ofScience and Technology in India. Table. 2gives the countrywise breakdown of patentsamong different users groups during 1968-72.The Table 1 and 2 are also illustrated graphi-cally. Table 3.gives the yearwise as well ascounteywtae distribution of patents during1968-72. Table 4 gives yearwise comparativeuse by 'A' and 'B' Users' gr oupe .

Inc reasing trend in the pe rcentageregistration of patents is represented graphi-cally also. (See graph I).

From Table 2, .in the next page, thefollowing,.observations can be made:

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TABLE 1. TOTAL REGISTRATION ANDYEARWlSE BREAKDOWN FORPATENTS during 1968-72

----------------- ----------------------- Percen-Total PatentsTear Registration Requested tage-------

K(1968-69) 18,200 852 4.68

L(1969-70) 19,000 846 4.45

M(1970-71) 21,786 1146 5.25

N0971-72) 20,500 1652- 8.05

Total 79,486 4494 5.65(Average)

The comparative use of patent literatureby 'A' group is more than 'B' groupexcept for Indian and Japanese patents.This is mainly att ributed to the fact thatalmost all industrial research is carriedout in the laboratories of CSIR which aregrouped under 'A' (See-gr aph 2).

The maximum demand was for U. S.patents (30.4010) by 'A'group and 22.4210by 'B' followed by British patents (14.1-3%and 5.9210) respectively by 'A' and 'B'.

3 There is comparat ively very littledemand for Indian patents. It is intere s-ting to note that Group 'B' uses more(1. 78'1.) of Indian patents than group 'A'(0.9110), for technical know-how. Sameis the case with Japanese patents. Onthe whole, poor rating is accorded byforeign as well as Indian users for Indianpatents.

The following observations can be madefrom figures in Table 4 (page 113):

There is a significant increase in the useof patents by 'A' users group. It isintere sting to obse rve that afte r (LlApril 1970, the percentage use by 'A'is almost double the use made by 'B'group. This can be attributed to increa-sing government participation forresearch and development projects is thepublic sector.

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YADAV &. VED BHUSHAN

TABLE 2. COUNTRYWISE BRFAKDOWN OF PATF,NTS AMONG DIFFERENT USERSGROUPS DURING 1968-72

Users' India US/ U.K. Germany France Japan USSR Nordic I Others

Group Canada countries

'10 &. Nos. (1) (2) (3) (4) (5) (6) (7) (8) (9)

--------

A 0.91 30.40 14. 13 4.42 2.80 0.80 0.81 O. 20 3.00

(2591 ) .(41 ) (1340) (668) (199) (126) (36) (37) (9) (135)

B 1. 78 20.42 5.92 3.42 1.47 1 24 0.44 0.24 1. 11

(624) (80) (918) (266) (154) (66) (56) (20) (11) (53)

C 0.11 3.05 1. 09 0.50 0.11 O. 09 0.04 0.04 0.48(270) (5) (163) (49) (22) (5) (4) (2) (2) (18)

D 0.20(9) (9)

~

TABLE 3. YEAR WISE &. COUNTRY WISE DISTRIBUTION OF PATENTS DURING 1968-72

Period India USI UK Germany ·France J'aparr USSR Nordic Others&. No. Canada Countries

(1) (2) (3) (4) (5) (6) :(7) (8) (9)

K 21 461 172 80 42 16 21 7 32L 38 395 199 70 5~ 14 10 1 67M 44 660 ~85 86 49 20 12 0 48N 32 905 387 139 54 46 16 14 59

Total No. 135 2421 ':183 375 197 96 59 22 206

'10 3.0 53.87 21.87 8.34 4.38 2. 15 l. 31 i>.49 4.59

rhe table shows that:1 Indian Patents fulfil only 3'10 of the requirements of our users.2 Our users are highly dependent onUS ICanada and U. K. for patent literature

Next in the order follow Gennany and France. .

112 Ann Llb Sel Doc

USE OF PATENT LITERATURE

TABLE 4. YEAR WISE COMPARATIVE USE BY A & B USERS GROUPS

Users'Group

__1U!I~0/. & No.

___L_J.~52L0/. & No.

__0_i1l44L0/0 and No.

~--LL0_~% and No.

A 46.00(392)

B 42.00( 358)

4 SUMMAR Y OF THE MAIN FINDINGS

a A mere 5.6 % use of patent litera-ture shows that in India patents are very underrated sources of scientific and technicalinformation.

b Indian patents cover only 3% ofthe users' basic need; for the remaining 970/0,our users are dependent on foreign patentswhich points to the substandard of Indianpatents as compared to its counterparts.

c Uee of patent literature by 'A'group has since April 1970 corrs ide r ab Iy increa-sed as compared to 'B',

d Whereas patents of US, UK, Franceand Germany are much in demand by bothgroups, the Japanese and Indian patents arecomparatively more used 'by 'B' group.

Our patent system lacks the necessarytechnological back up from technologists,industrialists and exporters. They arebiased towards fo r e ign technical know-howand discourage our indigenous technology forresearch and deve lopment projects. Inspite ofthis, Indian ability to adopt and improve uponcurrent technology has been quite successfulin such technological fields as Telephone, Radioand Television industrie s.

5 SUGGESTIONS

Research and development projectsdo not lead to economic success by themselvesun le s s there is rapid technology transfer [101.If the state as found by the present studyexists, little can be expected of develop'mental

Vol 20 No 1-4 Mar-Dee 1973

44.66(378)

66.77(1103 )

62.76(718)

48.34(409)

32.41(371 )

29.42(480)

programmes of our country. India should makethe utmost of he r patent system fo r promotingtechnical know-how. In this context, a compre-hensive survey should be undertaken to makean assessment of what the patent systems hasto its credit as a result of its existence inIndia fo r more than a century.

There should be an arrangement to ensurethat work done in India is patented only inIndia. No less significant is the fact of givingproper publicity for exploitation of our patentspecifications and create among industrialistsand manufacturers a "we -feeling" for ourpatents. There should be an effective lite ra-ture search which is an important part ofpatent examination procedure.

Due to tremendous significance of patentliterature for industrial and technologicaladvancement, it would be quite use ful toinvestigate how far it is po s s ib le for PatentOffice, Calcutta, CSIR p~tent unit, Invention

, Promotion Board and National ResearchDeVelopment Council to coordinate and re-organize the ir info rmation hand ling ac'ti v i.tie s.In this context, a report prepared by INS DOCfor organizing the patents' library and infor-mation centre at the request of the ControllerGeneral of Patents, Designs and Trade Marksis significant.

It may be suggested here that the libraryof the Indian Patent Office should render acomprehensive documentation service atnational and inte.rnational level taking uponitself the entire responsibility for a microfilm/reprint se rvice fo r Indian as we 11 as foreignpatents (at least U Sand British Patents). 'Translation service for foreign language patentsindexing and abstracting of patents, may be 'done in coordination with other institutions

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YADAV II VED BHUSHAN

at national level on the pattern of RU88IA. Ata later stage the library ofth~ Indian PatentOffice may be upgraded to the statu.s of 'IndianInstitute of Patent Documentation' .

REFERENCES

1 HOUGHTON, Bernard: Technical InformationSources. Clive Bingley London 1971.

Z DUTTA, S: Patents in India, Ann Lib Sc1961, 8(2), 55 -68.

3 DAVISON, Geo H: Facts conce sntng patentsof particular interest to industrial librar-ians and information officers. Aslib Proc1953.2. : 101-IZ0.

4 WARREN. Weaver: The patent office prob-lems, Am Doc 1955. ~ : H9-33.

5 FINLAY. A F: Guide to foreigp-Ianguageprinted patents and applications. Aslib1969 • .p iv.

114

6 VcERACNIJ. RP: Patent Information and itsproblems. Unesco Bull for Libraries1969. 23(5): Z34

7 U N - Department of Economic Affairs. Therole of patents in the transfer of technolo-gy to developing countries. United Nations1964.

8 AIMS. A: Survey of Information needs ofphvsicsts II chemists. J Doc 1965.nI2): 83 -90.

9 SLATER, M: Technica1libraries. Usersand their demands. Aslib 1964.

1'0 SANDERS. Barkev S: Speedy entry ofpatented inventions into commercialuse. IDEA, Patent Trademark IICopyright J of Research IIEducation,1962, ~ : 1.

ADo Lib Sel Doc

YADAV & VED BHUSHAN

GRAPH - 1

Patent requests Vs Years1 Div. of Y axis = 10 Patent requestsK= 1968-69L = 1969-70M= 1970-71N= 1971-7215

.,..•.eII.•.0Q....

J?l!.,.II:::Ii.....0

0Z

~------~------~------~------~+XYear

GRAPH - 2yComparative use by 'A' & '8' Groups1 Div of Y axis:: 10 Patent requests14

IIID: A0= B

,.

• I

6

0 .JIIli:L1 ~;I 9CI/S-8 ~ II~~

..t:. .;:>-. u .~0 ~ e u·C~ e .- ..:::>u :::> e ., .s: :::I :0 Vi a "E §0 .. .•.0 .s ViE u.. Ou :::> 0 :£8..,tI

C>

Vol 20 No ) -4 March - Dee) 973 lIS