For the last few months I have been poring over and collating the IPOs data and am pleased to announce that the result of that work is Facts and figures: 2013 and 2014. This labour of love provides an overview of our activities throughout the year and the transactions we have with our design, patent & trade mark customers.
We do this to be open and transparent, but also to allow others to explore the numbers and do their own analysis. We also provide an opportunity for researchers to undertake statistical analysis on our patent and trade mark data sets which cover a longer period of time. By investigating these numbers you can understand trends within various technologies and the impact this may have on the wider economy.
So what advice can we give to those noble researchers so they avoid common mistakes? We have a good handbook published by our Informatics team which shows how you can analyse and interpret the available data. A common mistake is the use of patent data to measure the level of “innovation” that is occurring across the world. There are many ways you can protect an innovation such as trade secrets and confidentiality agreements. But counting patent applications does not provide a full measure of innovation. Why might this be the case? Reading page 5 of the handbook will give you a good overview of the difference, but no spoilers here I’m afraid! I encourage you to read the handbook before undertaking any analysis, I have found it useful.
The format of Facts and figures has remained similar for years, but does this format work for you? Do you find it useful or relevant? Could we present things better? What numbers were you looking for and did you find them? And if you did find them, did you understand them? From wanting a peek to an in depth analysis, what sparked your interest in looking at our data? Any feedback you can give will be useful. I look forward to hearing from you.
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