How to use patents in an Open Innovation approach?

Analysis of patents has a strategic added value: it allows to situate a research project in the industrial context and to contribute to an estimation of its value.

The place of patents is therefore fundamental in the innovation process. Thanks to the information contained in a patent (see article "What type of information is contained in a patent?"), the reader has access to a vast source of technological and legal information that can help him to :

• Avoid reproducing Research & Development work
• Improve existing products and processes
• Understand the innovative activities and future direction of competitors in order to refine future market positioning
• Extract and analyze the main trends in specific technical areas and thus assess their degree of maturity