Intellectual Property Office Intellectual Property Office is an operating name of the Patent Office
A study of UK nanotech patents by the Informatics team at the Intellectual Property Office has identified promising areas for investment, writes Mark Lewney In 1960, just a year after having offered a $1000 prize to the first person to construct an electric motor which could fit inside a cube with sides measuring 1/64th of an inch, Richard Feynman was confronted by a man holding a large box. The Nobel Prize winner, preparing to dismiss the man as yet another crank, watched as he opened the box and took out a microscope. “Uh oh” said Feynman. If the man whom TIME® magazine named the smartest on the planet could be caught unawares by the pace of change in nanotechnology, it is clear that precise information regarding the current state of play in the field is essential if one does not wish to leave oneself similarly exposed.
A new service provided by the Intellectual Property Office offers such valuable analysis for any emerging technology, with nanotechnology representing just one recent example. “Patents contain a huge amount of applied technical knowledge that cannot be found elsewhere” says Ben Buchanan, co-compiler of the UK Innovation Nanotechnology Patent Landscape Analysis, which set out to identify the UK’s strengths and weaknesses across the nanotech landscape by analysing all such patents having a UK priority, applicant or inventor. “The IPO Patent Informatics Team use that unique data to reveal sectoral trends, whitespace, competitor intelligence and emergent technology in line with
“Patents contain a huge amount of applied technical knowledge that cannot be found elsewhere” - Ben Buchanan, IPO Informatics team
your business or investment strategy. It can also point research groups in the direction of proven, effective solutions allowing them to avoid the duplication of work which results in vast sums of money being wasted each year.” The report highlights the UK’s strength in bionanotechnology, with commercial organisations such as Tioxide and the Cancer Research Campaign leading the way in wellestablished medical and cosmetic applications, while university patents were spread far more broadly reflecting vibrant ongoing research in nanostructures and electrical applications such as light guides and semiconductors. It also identified an area in which the UK appears to be underrepresented – nanotoxicity – interest in which peaked in 2005 following fears raised in the press1 by the Prince of Wales regarding the possibility of a thalidomide-style disaster caused by nanotechnology, which may ironically have incentivised research rather than curtailing it. Breaking the dataset of more than six thousand patents down by subject matter over time, as in figure 1, yields more detailed insight. However, it is important to correct one likely misinterpretation at the outset: the graphs tail off towards the present not due to zero patent applications currently being received, but because of the delays in processing and publishing them. Nevertheless, it is clear that some nanotech applications, especially the medical and cosmetic applications shown in the first four graphs, have a longer history of activity and may now be in true decline following peaks in the 1990s or early 2000s. On the other hand, the more physics and electronicsbased applications in the lower graphs show a more recent emergence such that the apparent decline might solely be explained by processing delays, when in fact their activity may still be vigorous, even growing. Especially promising is the middle turquoise plot for light guides, which shows an upturn at the present even despite such delays, possibly indicating the start of a period of growth, thanks in part to Glasgow University’s strong interest in this area.
“Menace in the minutiae” – HRH the Prince of Wales, Comment in the Independent on Sunday, 11th July 2004, available from http://www.independent.co.uk/opinion/ commentators/hrh-the-prince-of-wales-menace-in-theminutiae-552733.html
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66 success through nanomaterials