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How to prioritize inventions
World Patent Information 48 (2017) 78e95
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World Patent Information journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/worpatin
How to prioritize inventions Thomas L. Saaty a, Elena Rokou b, * a b
University of Pittsburgh, United States Creative Decisions Foundation, United States
a r t i c l e i n f o
a b s t r a c t
Article history: Received 6 May 2015 Received in revised form 2 February 2017 Accepted 7 February 2017
In this paper we consider many intangible criteria that influence the priorities and ranks of inventions as they contribute to human welfare, by using the Analytic Hierarchy Process. We apply the ideas to evaluate a number of modern inventions along with a few old ones. Both the categories of inventions and the effects they have on human well-being and human progress are considered in this weighting process. Different effects of similar types of inventions could have different properties. To our knowledge this work breaks new ground about the numerical prioritization of all kinds of inventions because of the effort spent in structuring the process in a comprehensive hierarchy. © 2017 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
Keywords: OR in inventions Invention priority Patents Analytic hierarchy process Rating
1. Introduction Our inventions and technological progress are the best indicators of our ability to implement our ideas and they are part of the story that needs to be prioritized in order to place emphasis on what we can best do with our talents from improving health and longevity, to food and farming, to politics and conflict resolution to robots and computers, to communication and space travel. The kind and variety of modern inventions are a major international concern for those who seek new ideas to support their work or to use in practice. There are thousands of very useful and influential inventions that one may wish to examine with some kind of ordering of their importance. There is no orderly way in which one can study inventions and which ones are best to serve a certain purpose. A patent can be described as an exclusive right of limited duration over a new, non-obvious invention capable of industrial application, where the right to sue others for infringement is granted in return for publication of the invention [1]. Patents can be obtained for any new and useful process, new machine, manufacture or composition of matter, or anything new, useful, and not in relation to the prior art. In the past a patent could
* Corresponding author. E-mail addresses: [email protected] (T.L. Saaty), [email protected] (E. Rokou). http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.wpi.2017.02.003 0172-2190/© 2017 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
not be obtained for a system of doing business, an arrangement of printed matter, a mental process, computer applications, and product configurations [2] but nowadays patents are regularly obtained for business methods and computer applications. However, what can and cannot be patented varies between countries as patent laws are jurisdictional. The International Patent Classification (IPC), established by the Strasbourg Agreement 1971, provides for a hierarchical system of language independent symbols for the classification of patents and utility models according to the different areas of technology to which they pertain. Version 2015.01 of the IPC came into force on January 1, 2015. The IPC is an international classification code used to organize patent applications and based upon the inventive material as claimed in a patent application. The code is assigned to a patent purely for examination purposes in the patent offices [3]. In its April 25th, 2015 article about the process of invention, the Economist magazine [4] writes that inventions can come about in two ways. One is to bring together pre-existing components as in Edison's light bulb, and the other involves a lot of new ideas as in Shockley's transistor. They both illustrate two sorts of novelty in different proportion, discovery and recombination. In the United States Patent and Trademark Office patent documents are sorted into groups based on common subject matter by classifying the various technologies responsible for an inventions novelty. A class distinguishes one technology from another and a subclass represents both structural and functional features of the technology and
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thus each patent has two numbers associated with it for its class and subclass only one was used in the 19th century. This type of code goes back to 1790. A new class is created for an invention that cannot be treated in the way just described. In this paper we think we can do better in a more holistic way, but it is only a start. Measuring the strength of each patent as compared to other patents and prioritizing their processing in such a way that more important patents are the first to be examined can greatly influence the process of granting patents to inventors. This is a especially difficult process, and until now the proposed numerical measures to capture patents' strength are subject to sharp criticisms [5]. Patents are not readily measurable and they do not have an obvious impact on prices, thus a ranking of patents based only on tangibles is not an appropriate undertaking [6]. Determining a patent's actual overall contribution and using some kind of metrics to prioritize these contributions can be of great value not only to choose which patent should be examined first but also as a way for choosing which patentable assets should an enterprise submit to the IPC and which would be better left unpatented, as patenting is a costly process [7]. No methodically scientific way to deal with multicriteria ranking involving intangibles had been available to assign appropriate priority weights to each type of invention. Here we propose using the Analytic Hierarchy Process (AHP) for the measurement of intangibles, along with their dependence and feedback, to weight the criteria which we think play an important role in assigning
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priorities to inventions and their influences. Our methodology consists of the following steps: 1) An AHP model is developed to assign weights to different criteria used to prioritize different inventions and impacts. 2) Expert knowledge is used to define the criteria and evaluate the inventions and their impacts. 3) We prioritize the significance of five categories of importance of inventions to obtain the overall priority of an invention for each relevant criterion and add these priorities over the criteria to obtain the priority rank of that invention. 4) Our results do not violate intuition about the number and value of the invention and in fact take greater consideration by including the merits of the uses to which they are applied. Thus we also show that the ranking of inventions is reasonably close to the current results of identifying and classifying inventions [8]. The goal of this paper is to propose a methodology that allows the decision maker to prioritize inventions based on tangible and intangible criteria that rise from the International Patent Classification (IPC), established by the Strasbourg Agreement 1971. The aim is to provide a general framework not only to prioritize patents and give them a score (priority value) but also to define which components (criteria) were the ones that lead to that score.
Table 1 Relative consumption of drinks.
A¼
Drinks
Coffee
Wine
Tea
Beer
Sodas
Milk
Water
Derived priorities
Actual relative consumption
Coffee Wine Tea Beer Sodas Milk Water
1 1/9 1/3 1 2 1 2
9 1 3 9 9 9 9
3 1/3 1 4 5 4 5
1 1/9 1/4 1 2 1 1
1/2 1/9 1/5 1/2 1 1/2 1
1 1/9 1/4 1 2 1 2
1/2 1/9 1/5 1 1 1/2 1
0.142 0.019 0.046 0.164 0.252 0.148 0.228
0.133 0.014 0.040 0.173 0.267 0.129 0.240
Fig. 1. Overview of the IPC AHP model top levels with local and global priorities shown for each node.
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Table 2 2nd level's pairwise comparisons matrix, where x marks the spanning set used for the questionnaire.
1.1. 1.2. 1.3. 1.4. 1.5. 1.6. 1.7. 1.8.
Human Necessities Performing operations Transporting Chemistry; Metallurgy Textiles; Paper Fixed Constructions Mechanical engineering; Lighting; Heating; Weapons Physics Electricity
1.1.
1.2.
1.3.
1.4.
1.5.
1.6.
1.7.
1.8.
1
x 1
x x 1
x
x
x
x
x
2. How comparisons work to obtain priorities In making paired comparisons one assigns numbers to judgments about dominance. An element compared with itself with respect to a property or criterion is always equal to 1 so the main diagonal entries of the pairwise comparison matrix are all 1. The numbers 3,5, 7, and 9 correspond to the verbal judgments “moderately more dominant”, “strongly more dominant”, “very strongly more dominant”, and “extremely more dominant” (with 2, 4, 6, and 8 for compromise between the previous values). Reciprocal values are automatically entered in the transpose position. We are permitted to interpolate values between the integers, if desired or use numbers from an actual ratio scale of measurement. The decision making theory known as the Analytic Hierarchy Process (AHP) uses the integers 1 to 9 as its Fundamental Scale of Absolute Numbers corresponding to the verbal statements for the comparisons [9]. When the contrast is beyond the scale values, the
x 1
x 1
x 1
x 1
x 1
measurements are done in stages. One groups things into clusters with a common pivot from one cluster to the adjacent one and still uses the same scale to compare and combine the relative values. Here is an example. A matrix of paired comparison judgments was used to estimate relative drink consumption in the United States. To make the comparisons, the types of drinks are listed on the left and at the top of Table 1, and judgment is made as to how strongly the consumption of a drink on the left dominates that of a drink at the top. For example, when coffee on the left is compared with wine at the top, it is thought that coffee is consumed extremely more and a 9 is entered in the first row and second column position. A 1/9 is automatically entered in the second row and first column position, because when the second drink is compared with the first, it has the reciprocal value. If the consumption of a drink on the left does not dominate that of a drink at the top, the reciprocal value is entered. Again in comparing coffee and water in the first row and eighth column position, water is
Fig. 2. Expansion of Human Necessities to show its subcriteria and priorities (local; global).
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Fig. 3. Expansion of Performing operations to show its subcriteria and priorities (local; global).
consumed more than coffee slightly and a 1/2 is entered there. Correspondingly, a value of 2 is entered in the eighth row and first column position. At the left of Table 1, we see that the derived values and the actual values (obtained from various pages of Statistical Abstract of the United States) are close by nearly any measure of closeness. The scale has been mathematically derived from stimulus response theory and is not an arbitrary set of numbers used to compare homogeneous elements. It has been extended to cover a much wider range by grouping things into clusters and using a pivot element from one cluster to an adjacent one. The theory itself provides us with a compatibility index between the derived and actual outcomes without the need to use statistical theory for each calculation. We denote by x ¼ xi, and y ¼ yj respectively the derived and actual scale priorities, and by c ¼ cij
where cij is obtained as the element-wise product cij ¼ ðxi =xj Þðyj =yi Þ of one matrix of ratios of the two scales and the transpose of the other matrix of ratios. We then sum all the elements of C and divide by n2 to obtain the Compatibility Index number that represents deviation from perfect consistency of the two ratios. The index for the drinks example is 1.036. If the two vectors were identical, the index would be 1. The less compatible they are, the more the value will be above 1. 3. Summary of the mathematics of comparisons One can easily see that the ratio of two numbers from the same ratio scale is an absolute number. What is powerful about a ratio scale is that in normalized form it has the same values no matter
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Fig. 4. Expansion of Chemistry; Metallurgy to show its subcriteria and priorities (local; global).
T.L. Saaty, E. Rokou / World Patent Information 48 (2017) 78e95
what its original multiplier was. Thus two batches of bananas that weigh 3 and 6 kilograms on normalization, have the relative weights 3/(3 þ 6) ¼ 1/3 and 6/(3 þ 6) ¼ 2/3. These two batches also have the weight in pounds of 6.63 and 13.26 respectively. When normalized, these weights are again 6.63/(6.63 þ 13.26) ¼ 1/3 and 13.26/(6.63 þ 13.26) ¼ 2/3. Thus, when normalized, ratio scales are reduced to a standard form. Our approach is based on using absolute numbers which, unlike ratio scales which are invariant under a similarity transformation fðxÞ ¼ ax (for a constant a>0), are invariant only under the identity transformation fðxÞ ¼ x. We must filter or interpret the intensities of magnitudes of numbers in terms of our own sense of importance. In fact, we can use absolute numbers to construct a fundamental scale of priorities across all dimensions of experience by making paired comparisons of two elements at a time using the smaller or lesser element as the unit and estimating the larger one as a multiple of that unit with respect to a common property or criterion which they have in common. From such paired comparisons we can then derive an overall priority scale of relative importance for all the elements. Finally, we can combine such priority scales with respect to different criteria by weighting each scale by the weight of the corresponding criterion. We then add over the criteria to obtain a priority scale of measurement for all the elements with respect to all the criteria. The equations we encounter in deriving an absolute scale for pairwise comparisons in the case of a finite number of judgments are: n X
aij wj ¼ lmax wi ; i ¼ 1; :::; n
(1)
j¼1
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that dominates all the other eigenvalues in modulus (as they may be complex conjugates), and the principal eigenvector which corresponds to the principal eigenvalue has real and positive components. He also proved that when A is raised to infinite powers, its columns converge to the principal eigenvector. Another German mathematician Georg Frobenius generalized the theorem to matrix that is nonnegative and the major difference between his result and that of Perron is that the principal eigenvalue may not strictly dominate but be equal to the next largest eigenvalue in modulus [10].
4. Criteria to weight inventions The priorities of different kinds of inventions depend on several criteria. Fig. 1 represents the top-level network of the Analytic Hierarchy Process model together with the criteria. Table 2 lists the relevant basic criteria groupings or clusters and the elements in each cluster. The top three levels of the hierarchical Inventions Prioritization Model are shown in Fig. 1. There are 8 main criteria nodes, which in turn have varying numbers of children nodes, some of which also have children nodes of their own. The 1.1 human necessities node is expanded to show those nodes (Fig. 2). For the detailed expansion of the other bottom level nodes, please see Figs. 3-9. The numbering convention is that the Goal node, in our case “Human survival, well being and satisfaction” gets a code composed of a single number “1”, its children nodes have a two number code 1.x, their children nodes a three numbers code 1.x.y where 1.x is the code of their parent, and the bottom level nodes a four numbers code 1.x.y.z. This is a ratings model in which the alternatives are the inventions that are to be prioritized. Ratings models consist of a
with aji ¼ 1/aij or aij aji ¼ 1 (the reciprocal property), aij > 0 (thus A is known as a positive matrix) whose solution is normalized so that n X
wi ¼ 1
(2)
i¼1
When aij ¼ aij ajk ; i; j; k; ¼ 1; :::; n the matrix A ¼ ðaij Þ is said to be consistent and its maximum eigenvalue is equal to n. The matrix A is called reciprocal if it only satisfies the condition aij ¼ 1=aji i; j ¼ 1; :::; n. Thus A may be reciprocal but not consistent. A is consistent if and only if aij ¼ wi =wj . If A is simply reciprocal and positive, but not consistent that is aij ajk saik does not hold for some i, j and k, then we must have:
aij ¼
! wi ε ; wj ij
εij ¼
1 ;ε >0 εji ij
(3)
A right eigenvector w is a solution of Aw ¼ lw and a left eigenvector y of A is a solution of the equation yA ¼ ly For a consistent matrix, the corresponding entries of the normalized left and right eigenvectors are reciprocals. We only use the eigenvector corresponding to the largest eigenvalue (of which there are n because A is of order n) known as the principal right eigenvector. The reason for that is because in making paired comparison judgments one must identify the smaller or lesser element and use it as a unit and then estimate how many multiples of that unit the larger element dominates it in value. We cannot tell what fraction of the larger element the smaller one is without first using it as the unit. Knowing that the left and right eigenvectors are reciprocals when we have consistency will be useful in the continuous case. The German mathematician Oskar Perron proved that if A has positive entries, its principal eigenvalue is always a positive real number
Fig. 5. Expansion of Textiles; Paper to show its subcriteria and priorities (local; global).
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Fig. 6. Expansion of Fixed Constructions to show its subcriteria and priorities (local; global).
hierarchical part, the goal, criteria, subcriteria and so on that are prioritized by pairwise comparisons in the usual way while the alternatives are rated for their performance on the bottom level criteria, the covering criteria, in a ratings spreadsheet. The criteria in the 2nd, 3rd and 4th level of the model are listed in Table 3 along with their local and global priorities, calculated by the method previously described. The priorities derive from a group decision process, where a group of experts were each given a questionnaire to make their pairwise comparison judgments about the importance of the criteria. An excerpt is shown in Fig. 10. For each judgment first the dominant factor is selected, then how strongly more dominant, using the 1e9 Fundamental scale [8]. This AHP questionnaire doesn't require the decision maker to all the pairwise comparisons of the model, as that would be quite large as there would be n*(n1)/2 questions to do all the judgments for every comparison set. The minimum number of judgments required is to have at least one judgment in every row and column, known as a spanning set; but a compromise shortened version that is a spanning set, but also
offers some redundancy is to fill out the 1st line plus the diagonal above the main diagonal of ones in the usual matrix view (Table 2). Because it is our hope to show the interested reader all the detail of our long and hard work on this subject, we have kept the tables that we used to ask people to compare the elements in the different levels of our hierarchy. Otherwise, we do not insist on keeping them if it is thought they should be taken out. There were 30 experts for this study. The people were asked to fill out the comparison judgments for the criteria and subcriteria. In the following tables are the matrices of judgments they had to fill out. Their final outcomes were synthesized by using the geometric mean as necessary when dealing with judgments. These are the local priorities listed as the first number next to each criterion. The global priorities, listed as the second number in the figures, were obtained by weighting and adding. However, the goal of the study is more to present a way to evaluate inventions and less to state which invention is more important. Because the judgments require use of reciprocal values it turns out mathematically that one needs to use the geometric instead of
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Fig. 7. Expansion of Mechanical engineering; Lighting; Heating; Weapons to show its subcriteria and priorities (local; global).
the arithmetic mean of the values entered by each decision maker for each question [10]. Local priorities result from pairwise comparing the children nodes with respect to their parent node and summing to 1.0. Global priorities are the local priorities weighted by the global priority of the parent node. The global priorities for the 1st and 2nd level are the same as the local priorities. As we just said, for the lower levels (3rd and 4th) the global priorities are calculated by multiplying the local priorities of the children nodes by the global priority of the parent. In Fig. 2, the expansion into the bottom level of sub-criteria is shown with the local and global priorities in parentheses. The priority of the Human Necessities node is 0.261; this is its local priority, and as its parent node is the goal node with a priority of 1, it is also its global priority. This special situation only applies to the first level of criteria in Fig. 1. In a ratings model priorities are established for the covering criteria (the bottom-most level of subcriteria) using pairwise comparisons then the alternatives are rated one at a time against them to establish their priorities. In this ratings model we used the same priority scale (see Table 4) for each covering criterion, and rated each alternative for its performance on
those criteria for which it deserved score. In Table 5 the ratings table for 13 selected inventions, the column headings, is shown. The criteria to which any of the inventions contributed were abstracted from the complete ratings spreadsheet. Each row represents a bottom-most level of subcriteria on which one or more of the alternatives got a score. The first column contains the global priorities of the respective criterions and there is one column for each of the inventions that are being rated. To calculate the final score (Table 6), the value of the rating is multiplied by the global priority of the criterion and summed for each invention. For example, to calculate the light bulb's score we have: 1*0.005 þ 1*0.006 þ 1*0.044 ¼ 0.055. The idealized value is calculated by finding the highest ratings score and diving by that all the entries. In the idealized score the invention with the highest score gets a value of 1.000. 5. Conclusions The first patent offices were founded in Europe. It was the first time that people had a written statement on how to grant patents.
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Fig. 8. Expansion of Physics to show its subcriteria and priorities (local; global).
It was decided that only innovations that are useful and genuinely novel, should be eligible for a patent. From that point on, the system of intellectual property has played an important role in generating economic growth and also encouraging inventors and entrepreneurs by ensuring that they can make money from their ideas. Only in 2010 the American Patent Office granted 244,358 patents out of the applications it examined [4]. Year by year the number of inventions submitted to the Patent Offices all over the world grows.
Although it is a very difficult task to classify and rate the submitted inventions there has been no way, to the best of these authors knowledge, to evaluate inventions based on their effect on human well-being and progress. To our knowledge this work breaks new ground about the numerical prioritization of all kinds of inventions because of the effort spent in structuring the process in a comprehensive hierarchy. Using this approach we were able to determine that inventions falling under the categories of Human
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Fig. 9. Expansion of Electricity to show its subcriteria and priorities (local; global).
Table 3a Comparisons of the first level. Human survival and well-being and satisfaction
(a)
(a) Human necessities (b) Performing operations; Transporting (c) Chemistry; Metallurgy (d) Textiles; Paper (e) Fixed constructions
(b)
(c)
(d)
(e)
1 1 1 1 1
Human survival and well-being and satisfaction
(a)
(a) Fixed constructions (b) Mechanical engineering; Lighting; Heating; Weapons; Blasting (c) Physics (d) Electricity
(b)
(c)
(d)
1 1 1 1
Table 3b Comparisons of the second level. Human necessities (a) Agriculture (b) Foodstuffs; Tobacco (c) Personal or domestic articles (d) Health; Life-saving; Amusement Performing operations; Transporting (a) Separating; Mixing (b) Shaping (c) Printing (d) Transporting (e) Micro-structural technology; Nano-technology Chemistry; Metallurgy (a) Chemistry (b) Metallurgy (c) Combinatorial technology
(a)
(b)
1 1 (a)
(b)
(c)
1 1 1 (a)
(b)
(c)
1 1 1 (a)
(b)
1 1 (a)
(a) Building (b) Earth or rock drilling; Mining
(a) Instruments (b) Nucleonics
(e)
1
Fixed constructions
Physics
(d)
1
(a) Textiles or flexible materials not otherwise provided for (b) Paper
(a) Engines or pumps (b) Engineering in general (c) Lighting; Heating (d) Weapons; Blasting
(d)
1
Textiles; Paper
Mechanical engineering; Lighting; Heating; Weapons; Blasting
(c)
1
(b)
1 1 (a)
(b)
(c)
(d)
1 1 1 1 (a)
(b)
1 1
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Table 3c Comparisons of the third level. Foodstuffs; Tobacco
(a)
(a) baking; equipment for making or processing doughs; doughs for baking (b) butchering; meat treatment; processing poultry or fish (c) tobacco; cigars; cigarettes; smokers' requisites
(b)
(c)
1 1 1
Personal or domestic articles
(a)
(a) wearing apparel (b) headwear (c) footwear (d) haberdashery; jewellery (e) hand or travelling articles (f) brushware (g) furniture; domestic articles or appliances; coffee mills; spice mills; suction cleaners in general Health; Life-saving; Amusement
(b)
(c)
(e)
1 1 1 1 1 (b)
(c)
1 1 1 (a) (b) (c) (d) (e)
(a) crushing, pulverising, or disintegrating; preparatory treatment of grain for milling (b) separation of solid materials using liquids or using pneumatic tables or jigs; magnetic or electrostatic separation of solid materials from solid materials or fluids; separation by high-voltage electric fields (c) centrifugal apparatus or machines for carrying-out physical or chemical processes (d) spraying or atomising in general; applying liquids or other fluent materials to surfaces, in general (e) generating or transmitting mechanical vibrations in general Separating; Mixing
(a)
(a) generating or transmitting mechanical vibrations in general (b) separating solids from solids; sorting (c) cleaning (d) disposal of solid waste; reclamation of contaminated soil
(b)
1 1 1
(c)
(d)
1 1 (a)
Shaping
(a)
(a) working or preserving wood or similar material; nailing or stapling machines in general (b) working cement, clay, or stone (c) working of plastics; working of substances in a plastic state in general (d) presses (e) making paper articles; working paper (f) layered products Printing
(b)
(c)
(d)
(e)
(f)
(g)
1 1 1 1 1 1 1 (b)
(c)
(d)
(e)
(f)
1 1 1 1 1 1
(a)
(a) printing; lining machines; typewriters; stamps (b) bookbinding; albums; files; special printed matter (c) writing or drawing implements; bureau accessories (d) decorative arts
(b)
(c)
(d)
1 1 1 1 (a)
(b)
(c)
(d)
(e)
1 1 1 1 1
Transporting
(a)
(a) aircraft; aviation; cosmonautics (b) conveying; packing; storing; handling thin or filamentary material (c) hoisting; lifting; hauling (d) opening or closing bottles, jars or similar containers; liquid handling (e) saddlery; upholstery
(b)
(c)
(d)
(e)
1 1 1 1 1
Micro-structural technology; Nano-technology
(a)
(a) micro-structural technology (b) nano-technology
(a) inorganic chemistry
1
1
(a) mechanical metal-working without essentially removing material; punching metal (b) casting; powder metallurgy (c) machine tools; metal-working not otherwise provided for (d) grinding; polishing (e) hand tools; portable power-driven tools; handles for hand implements; workshop equipment; manipulators (f) hand cutting tools; cutting; severing (g) working or preserving wood or similar material; nailing or stapling machines in general
Chemistry
1
1
Shaping
(a) vehicles in general (b) railways (c) land vehicles for travelling otherwise than on rails (d) ships or other waterborne vessels; related equipment (e) aircraft; aviation; cosmonautics
(g)
1
Separating; Mixing
Transporting
(f)
1
(a)
(a) medical or veterinary science; hygiene (b) life-saving; fire-fighting (c) sports; games; amusements
(d)
(b)
1 1 (a) 1
(b)
(c)
(d)
(e)
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Table 3c (continued ) Chemistry
(a)
(b)
(b) treatment of water, waste water, sewage, or sludge (c) glass; mineral or slag wool (d) cements; concrete; artificial stone; ceramics; refractories (e) fertilisers; manufacture there of
(c)
(d)
(e)
1 1 1 1
Chemistry
(a) (b) (c) (d) (e) (f)
(a) fertilisers; manufacture thereof 1 (b) explosives; matches (c) organic chemistry (d) organic macromolecular compounds; their preparation or chemical working-up; compositions based thereon (e) dyes; paints; polishes; natural resins; adhesives; compositions not otherwise provided for; applications of materials not otherwise provided for (f) petroleum, gas or coke industries; technical gases containing carbon monoxide; fuels; lubricants; peat Chemistry
(a)
(a) petroleum, gas or coke industries; technical gases containing carbon monoxide; fuels; lubricants; peat (b) animal or vegetable oils, fats, fatty substances or waxes; fatty acids therefrom; detergents; candles (c) biochemistry; beer; spirits; wine; vinegar; microbiology; enzymology; mutation or genetic engineering (d) sugar industry (e) skins; hides; pelts; leather
(b)
1 1 1 1 1
(c)
(d)
1 1 1 1 1
Metallurgy
(a) (b) (c) (d) (e)
(a) metallurgy of iron 1 (b) metallurgy; ferrous or non-ferrous alloys; treatment of alloys or non-ferrous metals (c) coating metallic material; coating material with metallic material; chemical surface treatment; diffusion treatment of metallic material; coating by vacuum evaporation, by sputtering, by ion implantation or by chemical vapour deposition, in general; inhibiting corrosion of metallic material or incrustation in general (d) electrolytic or electrophoretic processes; apparatus therefor (e) crystal growth Textiles or flexible materials not otherwise provided for
(a)
(a) natural or man-made threads or fibres; spinning (b) yarns; mechanical finishing of yarns or ropes; warping or beaming (c) weaving (d) braiding; lace-making; knitting; trimmings; non-woven fabrics (e) sewing; embroidering; tufting (f) treatment of textiles or the like; laundering; flexible materials not otherwise provided for (g) ropes; cables other than electric Building (a) construction of roads, railways, or bridges (b) hydraulic engineering; foundations; soil-shifting (c) water supply; sewerage (d) building (e) locks; keys; window or door fittings; safes (f) doors, windows, shutters, or roller blinds, in general; ladders
(e)
(a)
(b)
(c)
(d)
(e)
1 1
1 1 (f)
(g)
1 1 1 1 1 1 1 (b)
(c)
(d)
(e)
(f)
1 1 1 1 1 1
Engines or pumps
(a) (b) (c) (d)
(a) machines or engines in general; engine plants in general; steam engines 1 (b) combustion engines; hot-gas or combustion-product engine plants (c) machines or engines for liquids; wind, spring, or weight motors; producing mechanical power or a reactive propulsive thrust, not otherwise provided for (d) positive-displacement machines for liquids; pumps for liquids or elastic fluids Engineering in general
1 1 1 (a) (b) (c)
(a) fluid-pressure actuators; hydraulics or pneumatics in general 1 (b) engineering elements or units; general measures for producing and maintaining effective functioning of machines or installations; thermal insulation in general (c) storing or distributing gases or liquids Lighting; Heating (a) lighting (b) steam generation (c) combustion apparatus; combustion processes (d) heating; ranges; ventilating (e) refrigeration or cooling; combined heating and refrigeration systems; heat pump systems; manufacture or storage of ice; liquefaction or solidification of gases Lighting; Heating
1 1
(a) (b) (c) (d) (e) 1 1 1 1 1 (a) (b) (c) (d)
(a) refrigeration or cooling; combined heating and refrigeration systems; heat pump systems; manufacture or storage of ice; liquefaction or solidification of 1 gases (b) drying (c) furnaces; kilns; ovens; retorts (d) heat exchange in general
1 1 1
90
T.L. Saaty, E. Rokou / World Patent Information 48 (2017) 78e95
Weapons; Blasting
(a)
(a) weapons (b) ammunition; blasting
(b)
1 1
Instruments
(a)
(a) measuring; testing (b) optics (c) photography; cinematography; analogous techniques using waves other than optical waves; electrography; holography (d) horology (e) controlling; regulating (f) computing; calculating; counting (g) checking-devices
1
Instruments
(d)
(a) checking-devices (b) signalling (c) educating; cryptography; display; advertising; seals (d) musical instruments; acoustics (e) information storage (f) instrument details
(a)
(b)
(c)
(b)
(c)
(d)
(e)
(f)
(g)
1 1 1 1 1 1 (e)
(f)
1 1 1 1 1 1
Electricity
(a)
(a) basic electric elements (b) generation, conversion, or distribution of electric power (c) basic electronic circuitry (d) electric communication technique
(b)
(c)
(d)
1 1 1 1
Fig. 10. Excerpt from the AHP questionnaire.
Necessities, Electricity, Mechanical Engineering and Physics are those that should be prioritized. Looking back on the data about the patents awarded in the last two centuries, most of them actually fall in these four categories. Finally, given a list of inventions from the last 100 years and asking a group of individuals to rate them using the proposed approach, we see how the different inventions have actually affected the people of this generation. For example inventions like the steam engine locomotive, that the new generation had never
Table 4 Rating scale used to rate the inventions against the covering criteria. Rating
Value
Very High High Medium Low Very Low
1 0.619 0.380 0.238 0.143
T.L. Saaty, E. Rokou / World Patent Information 48 (2017) 78e95
91
Table 5 Ratings table of selected inventions. Only the criteria with global priorities greater than 0.0009 were included. Name
wheel clock traffic Global steam lights Priorities engine locomotive
light airplane radio bulb
tv
atomic cooking printing bomb stove
pacemaker computer
1.1.1. Agriculture
0.096
0
1.1.2.1. baking; equipment for making/ processing doughs; doughs for baking 1.1.2.2. butchering; meat treatment; processing poultry or fish 1.1.3.7.furniture; domestic articles or appliances; coffee mills; spice mills; suction cleaners in general 1.1.4.1. medical/veterinary science; hygiene 1.1.4.2. life-saving; fire-fighting
0.015
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
Very High 0
Very Low Very High
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0.020
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
Very 0 High
Very High Very High
0.005
0
0
0
0
Very 0 High
Very High
0
0
0
0.052
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
Very High 0
0.034
0
0
0.380952 0
1.1.4.3. sports; games; amusements
0.008
0
0
0
0
Very High 0
1.2.1.1. crushing, pulverising/ disintegrating; preparatory treatment of grain for milling 1.2.1.3. centrifugal apparatus/machines for carrying-out physical/chemical processes 1.2.1.5. generating/transmitting mechanical vibrations in general 1.2.2.2. casting; powder metallurgy
0.004
0
Very High Very High Very High
Very Low Very 0 Low 0 0 0
Very Low 0
0
Very High 0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0.003
0
Very High
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0.003
0
0
0.001
0
1.2.2.3. machine tools; metal-working 0.001 not otherwise provided for 1.2.2.4. grinding; polishing 0.001
0 0
0.002
0
Very High Very High Very High Very High Very High
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
Very Low
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0.002
0
Very High
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0.001
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0.005
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
Medium
0.002
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
Medium
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
High
0 Very High Very High 0
0 0
0 High
0 0
0 0
0 0
0 0
0 0
0 0
0
0
0 Very High 0
Very Low Very Low Very Low 0 0
Very High Very High Very High Very High Medium 0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
1.2.2.5. hand tools; portable powerdriven tools; handles for hand implements; workshop equipment; manipulators 1.2.2.7. working or preserving wood/ similar material; nailing/stapling machines in general 1.2.2.11. making paper articles; working paper 1.2.3.1. printing; lining machines; typewriters; stamps 1.2.3.2. book binding; albums; files; special printed matter 1.2.3.3. writing or drawing implements; bureau accessories 1.2.3.4. decorative arts 1.2.4.1. vehicles in general
0.002
0
0.001 0.006
0 0
1.2.4.2. railways
0.004
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
Very High 0
Very High High
0
Medium 0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
Medium 0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0.013
0
0
0
0
Very High 0
0
0
0
0
Medium
Medium
1.3.3. Combinatorial Technology
0.032
0
0
0
Medium 0
0
0
High
0.001
0
0
0
0
0
Very High 0
0
1.3.1.6. explosives; matches
Very High 0
1.3.1.9.dyes; paints; polishes; natural 0.001 resins; adhesives; compositions not otherwise provided for; applications of materials not otherwise provided for 0.002 1.3.1.10. petroleum, gas/coke industries; technical gases containing carbon monoxide; fuels; lubricants; peat
0
0
0
0
0
High
0
0
0
0
0
High
1.2.4.3. land vehicles for travelling 0.004 otherwise than on rails 1.2.4.4. ships/other waterborne vessels; 0.006 related equipment 1.2.4.5. aircraft; aviation; cosmonautics 0.004 1.2.5.1. micro-structural technology
0
0
0
0
0
0
Very High Very 0 High 0 Very High 0 0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
(continued on next page)
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Table 5 (continued ) Name
wheel clock traffic Global steam lights Priorities engine locomotive
light airplane radio bulb
tv
atomic cooking printing bomb stove
pacemaker computer
1.3.1.14. skins; hides; pelts; leather 1.3.2.1. metallurgy of iron
0.001 0.004
0 Very Low
0 0
0 0
0 0
0 0
0 0
0 0
0 0
0 0
High 0
0 0
0 0
1.3.2.2. metallurgy; ferrous or nonferrous alloys; treatment of alloys or non-ferrous metals 1.3.2.3. coating metallic material; coating material with metallic material; chemical surface treatment; diffusion treatment of metallic material; coating by vacuum evaporation, by sputtering, by ion implantation or by chemical vapour deposition, in general; inhibiting corrosion of metallic material or incrustation in general 1.3.2.4. electrolytic or electrophoretic processes; apparatus therefor 1.4.1.1. natural or man-made threads or fibres; spinning 1.4.1.3. weaving
0.003
0
0
0
0
0
Very High
Very Low 0
0 Very High 0
0
0
0
0
0.003
0
0
0
0
0
Very High
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0.004
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0.007
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0.008
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0.007
0
Very High Very High 0
Very 0 Low 0 0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
Medium 0
0
0.008
High
0
0
0
0
High
Low
Low
0
Low
Low
Low
Low
0.004
0
0
0
0
0
High
0
0
High
0
0
0
0
0.026
Low
0
0
0
0
High
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0.028
Medium
0
0
0
Very High High
0
0
0
0
Very Low Very Low
0
0 0 0
0 0 0
0 0 0
0 0 0
0 0 0
0 0 0
0 0 0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0 0 0 0 0 0
0 0 0 0 0 0
0 0 0 High 0 Medium
1.4.1.6. treatment of textiles or the like; laundering; flexible materials not otherwise provided for 1.6.1.1. machines or engines in general; engine plants in general; steam engines 1.6.1.2. combustion engines; hot-gas or combustion-product engine plants 1.6.2.1. fluid-pressure actuators; hydraulics or pneumatics in general 1.6.2.2. engineering elements or units; general measures for producing and maintaining effective functioning of machines or installations; thermal insulation in general 1.6.3.1. lighting 1.6.3.2. steam generation 1.6.3.3. combustion apparatus; combustion processes 1.6.3.4. heating; ranges; ventilating
0.006 0.003 0.003
0 0 Very High 0 0 0
0 0 0
0 0 0
1 0 0
0.005
0
0
0
0
0
0 0 Very High 0
1.6.3.7. furnaces; kilns; ovens; retorts
0.002
Low
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
1.6.4.1. weapons 1.6.4.2. ammunition; blasting 1.7.2. Nucleonics 1.7.1.1. measuring; testing 1.7.1.2. optics 1.7.1.3. photography; cinematography; analogous techniques using waves other than optical waves; electrography; holography 1.7.1.4. horology
0.004 0.004 0.047 0.006 0.003 0.002
0 0 0 0 0 0
0 0 0 0 0 0
0 0 0 0 0 0
0 0 0 0 0 0
0 0 0 0 0 0
High 0 0 0 0 0
0 0 0 0 0 Low
0 0 0 0 Low 1
1 1 1 0 0 0
Very Low Very Low 0 0 0 0 0 0
0.004
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
1.7.1.6. computing; calculating; counting 1.7.1.7. checking-devices 1.7.1.8. signalling 1.7.1.9. educating; cryptography; display; advertising; seals 1.7.1.10. musical instruments; acoustics 1.7.1.11. information storage 1.7.1.12. instrument details 1.8.1. basic electric elements 1.8.2. generation, conversion, or distribution of electric power 1.8.3. basic electronic circuitry 1.8.4. electric communication technique Ratings Score
0.005
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
1
0.006 0.003 0.005
0 0 0
0 0 0
Very High Very High 1 1 0
0 0 0
0 0 0
High 0 0
0 0 0 0 0 0 0.238095 0.619 0
0 0 0
0 0 High
0 0 0
0 0 0.619045
0.005 0.006 0.009 0.050 0.043
0 0 0 0 0
0 0 0 0 0
0 0 1 0 0
0 0 1 1 0
0 0 0 0 1
0 0 0 High 0
1 0.238095 0 0 0
0 0 0 0 1
0 0 0 0 0
0 0.380952 0 0 0
0 0 0 0 0
0 High 0 0 0
0.031 0.037
0 0
0 0
0 0
1 1
0 0
High 0
0 0 0 0.238095 0.381 0
0 0
0 0
0 0
0 High
0.030
0.178 0.027 0.166
0.060
0.062
0.025
0.096
0.070
0.055 0.183
1 0.381 0 0 0
0.072 0.117
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Table 6 Rating inventions using the IPC model, the higher the rating score or the closer to one the idealized score the higher the importance of the corresponding invention based on the answers of the given experts, e.g. airplane (score 0.183) is thought to be slightly more important than the wheel (score 0.178). Invention
Ratings Score
Idealized
steam engine locomotive wheel clock traffic lights light bulb airplane radio tv atomic bomb cooking stove printing pacemaker computer
0.030 0.178 0.027 0.166 0.055 0.183 0.060 0.072 0.117 0.062 0.025 0.096 0.070
0.163 0.973 0.150 0.909 0.300 1.000 0.328 0.392 0.642 0.339 0.135 0.528 0.381
used or felt its effect in their everyday life, scored very low, while the wheel that we all think as one of the most important milestones in the history of humanity, scores very high along with the airplane that is felt now days as something essential.
Appendix. List of inventions evaluated
Field
Exemplary inventions
Agriculture Foodstuffs; Tobacco
plough, saw, reaper, fishing rod yeast, bread, oven freezer, tin cigarette, cigar, lighter coat, jean, shirt cap, crown, hairpin shoes, socks, tie, cravat, ring, necklace bag, wallet, suitcase brush bed, desk, table, cup, bowl, dish penicillin, aspirin, band-aid buoy, gas-mask, fire extinguisher sports equipment, cards, chess mill, grinder sheller, separator centrifuge sprayer shaker separator cleaner compactor puncher casting machine machine tool grinder, polisher scissors, screwdriver, hammer knife, axe chisel, nailing machine cement, clay kneader press machine papermaking technology inductance machine printer, typewriter stapling machine, folder ruler, pencil compass paint, platfond wheel, bike train, subway automobile, motorcycle ship, steamer airplane, shuttle, spaceship container conveyer belt tank, can
Personal or domestic articles
Health; Life-saving; Amusement
Separating; Mixing
Shaping
Printing
Transporting
(continued on next page)
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T.L. Saaty, E. Rokou / World Patent Information 48 (2017) 78e95 (continued ) Field Micro-structural technology; Nano-technology Chemistry
Metallurgy
Combinatorial technology Textiles or flexible materials not otherwise provided for
Paper Building
Earth or rock drilling; Mining Engines or pumps
Engineering in general
Lighting; Heating
Weapons; Blasting Instruments
Nucleonics
Exemplary inventions horse's hoof, spur fibre material nanophase materials salt, sugar water filter glass cement, clay, china chemical fertilizer gun powder, match benzene, aldehyde chemical fiber colourant, paint gasoline soya-bean oil, penut oil alcohol, beer, vinegar sugar, starch leather iron, copper, aluminium alloy stainless steel electrolyze, electroplate quartz, diamond composite material cotton thread, yarn spinning machine loom knitting sewing machine, embroidery machine laundering rope, cable paper-making concrete, floorslab digger, soil shifter waterpipe, tap road, railway, bridge lock, key door, window well drilling engine, steamer diesel, gasoline engine wind engine, spring engine pump hydraulic press damper gas cylinder, liquid cylinder light steamer stove heater refrigerator dryer kiln airconditioner gun, tank TNT, A-bomb ruler, thermometer telescope, glasses camera, film watch, clock sensor calculator, abacus X-ray tester signal lamp LED piano, violin computer screw, semiconductor nuclear reactor integrated circuit thermal power, wind power capacitor, resistor telegram, radio
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References [1] R. Pitkethly, The Valuation of Patents: a Review of Patent Valuation Methods with Consideration of Option Based Methods and the Potential for Further Research, Research Papers in Management Studies-University of Cambridge Judge Institute of Management Studies, 1997. [2] T. Hufker, F. Alpert, Patents: a managerial perspective, J. Prod. Brand Manag. 3 (4) (1994) 44e54. [3] World Intellectual Property Organization, International Patent Classification, Retrieved from:, 2016 www.wipo.int. [4] The Economist,Intellectual property and the economy-Patently absurd, The Economist (2011). http://www.economist.com/node/18651194. May 5th. [5] Y.J. Chiu, Y.W. Chen, Using AHP in patent valuation, Math. Comput. Model. 46
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(7) (2007) 1054e1062. [6] R.L. Parr, G.V. Smith, Quantitative methods of valuing intellectual property, in: M. Simensky, L.G. Bryer (Eds.), The New Role of Intellectual Property in Commercial Transactions, 1994, pp. 39e68. [7] M. Reitzig, What determines patent value?: Insights from the semiconductor industry, Res. Policy 32 (1) (2003) 13e26. [8] R.C. Cochrane, The National Academy of Sciences: the First Hundred Years, 1863-1963, National Academy Press, 1978. [9] T.L. Saaty, “Fundamentals of Decision making.”, RWS Publications, Pittsburgh, 1994. [10] S. Friedland, S. Gaubert, L. Han, PerroneFrobenius theorem for nonnegative multilinear forms and extensions, Linear Algebra its Appl. 438 (2) (2011;2013;2009) 738, http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.laa.2011.02.042.
Contents lists available at ScienceDirect
World Patent Information journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/worpatin
How to prioritize inventions Thomas L. Saaty a, Elena Rokou b, * a b
University of Pittsburgh, United States Creative Decisions Foundation, United States
a r t i c l e i n f o
a b s t r a c t
Article history: Received 6 May 2015 Received in revised form 2 February 2017 Accepted 7 February 2017
In this paper we consider many intangible criteria that influence the priorities and ranks of inventions as they contribute to human welfare, by using the Analytic Hierarchy Process. We apply the ideas to evaluate a number of modern inventions along with a few old ones. Both the categories of inventions and the effects they have on human well-being and human progress are considered in this weighting process. Different effects of similar types of inventions could have different properties. To our knowledge this work breaks new ground about the numerical prioritization of all kinds of inventions because of the effort spent in structuring the process in a comprehensive hierarchy. © 2017 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
Keywords: OR in inventions Invention priority Patents Analytic hierarchy process Rating
1. Introduction Our inventions and technological progress are the best indicators of our ability to implement our ideas and they are part of the story that needs to be prioritized in order to place emphasis on what we can best do with our talents from improving health and longevity, to food and farming, to politics and conflict resolution to robots and computers, to communication and space travel. The kind and variety of modern inventions are a major international concern for those who seek new ideas to support their work or to use in practice. There are thousands of very useful and influential inventions that one may wish to examine with some kind of ordering of their importance. There is no orderly way in which one can study inventions and which ones are best to serve a certain purpose. A patent can be described as an exclusive right of limited duration over a new, non-obvious invention capable of industrial application, where the right to sue others for infringement is granted in return for publication of the invention [1]. Patents can be obtained for any new and useful process, new machine, manufacture or composition of matter, or anything new, useful, and not in relation to the prior art. In the past a patent could
* Corresponding author. E-mail addresses: [email protected] (T.L. Saaty), [email protected] (E. Rokou). http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.wpi.2017.02.003 0172-2190/© 2017 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
not be obtained for a system of doing business, an arrangement of printed matter, a mental process, computer applications, and product configurations [2] but nowadays patents are regularly obtained for business methods and computer applications. However, what can and cannot be patented varies between countries as patent laws are jurisdictional. The International Patent Classification (IPC), established by the Strasbourg Agreement 1971, provides for a hierarchical system of language independent symbols for the classification of patents and utility models according to the different areas of technology to which they pertain. Version 2015.01 of the IPC came into force on January 1, 2015. The IPC is an international classification code used to organize patent applications and based upon the inventive material as claimed in a patent application. The code is assigned to a patent purely for examination purposes in the patent offices [3]. In its April 25th, 2015 article about the process of invention, the Economist magazine [4] writes that inventions can come about in two ways. One is to bring together pre-existing components as in Edison's light bulb, and the other involves a lot of new ideas as in Shockley's transistor. They both illustrate two sorts of novelty in different proportion, discovery and recombination. In the United States Patent and Trademark Office patent documents are sorted into groups based on common subject matter by classifying the various technologies responsible for an inventions novelty. A class distinguishes one technology from another and a subclass represents both structural and functional features of the technology and
T.L. Saaty, E. Rokou / World Patent Information 48 (2017) 78e95
thus each patent has two numbers associated with it for its class and subclass only one was used in the 19th century. This type of code goes back to 1790. A new class is created for an invention that cannot be treated in the way just described. In this paper we think we can do better in a more holistic way, but it is only a start. Measuring the strength of each patent as compared to other patents and prioritizing their processing in such a way that more important patents are the first to be examined can greatly influence the process of granting patents to inventors. This is a especially difficult process, and until now the proposed numerical measures to capture patents' strength are subject to sharp criticisms [5]. Patents are not readily measurable and they do not have an obvious impact on prices, thus a ranking of patents based only on tangibles is not an appropriate undertaking [6]. Determining a patent's actual overall contribution and using some kind of metrics to prioritize these contributions can be of great value not only to choose which patent should be examined first but also as a way for choosing which patentable assets should an enterprise submit to the IPC and which would be better left unpatented, as patenting is a costly process [7]. No methodically scientific way to deal with multicriteria ranking involving intangibles had been available to assign appropriate priority weights to each type of invention. Here we propose using the Analytic Hierarchy Process (AHP) for the measurement of intangibles, along with their dependence and feedback, to weight the criteria which we think play an important role in assigning
79
priorities to inventions and their influences. Our methodology consists of the following steps: 1) An AHP model is developed to assign weights to different criteria used to prioritize different inventions and impacts. 2) Expert knowledge is used to define the criteria and evaluate the inventions and their impacts. 3) We prioritize the significance of five categories of importance of inventions to obtain the overall priority of an invention for each relevant criterion and add these priorities over the criteria to obtain the priority rank of that invention. 4) Our results do not violate intuition about the number and value of the invention and in fact take greater consideration by including the merits of the uses to which they are applied. Thus we also show that the ranking of inventions is reasonably close to the current results of identifying and classifying inventions [8]. The goal of this paper is to propose a methodology that allows the decision maker to prioritize inventions based on tangible and intangible criteria that rise from the International Patent Classification (IPC), established by the Strasbourg Agreement 1971. The aim is to provide a general framework not only to prioritize patents and give them a score (priority value) but also to define which components (criteria) were the ones that lead to that score.
Table 1 Relative consumption of drinks.
A¼
Drinks
Coffee
Wine
Tea
Beer
Sodas
Milk
Water
Derived priorities
Actual relative consumption
Coffee Wine Tea Beer Sodas Milk Water
1 1/9 1/3 1 2 1 2
9 1 3 9 9 9 9
3 1/3 1 4 5 4 5
1 1/9 1/4 1 2 1 1
1/2 1/9 1/5 1/2 1 1/2 1
1 1/9 1/4 1 2 1 2
1/2 1/9 1/5 1 1 1/2 1
0.142 0.019 0.046 0.164 0.252 0.148 0.228
0.133 0.014 0.040 0.173 0.267 0.129 0.240
Fig. 1. Overview of the IPC AHP model top levels with local and global priorities shown for each node.
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Table 2 2nd level's pairwise comparisons matrix, where x marks the spanning set used for the questionnaire.
1.1. 1.2. 1.3. 1.4. 1.5. 1.6. 1.7. 1.8.
Human Necessities Performing operations Transporting Chemistry; Metallurgy Textiles; Paper Fixed Constructions Mechanical engineering; Lighting; Heating; Weapons Physics Electricity
1.1.
1.2.
1.3.
1.4.
1.5.
1.6.
1.7.
1.8.
1
x 1
x x 1
x
x
x
x
x
2. How comparisons work to obtain priorities In making paired comparisons one assigns numbers to judgments about dominance. An element compared with itself with respect to a property or criterion is always equal to 1 so the main diagonal entries of the pairwise comparison matrix are all 1. The numbers 3,5, 7, and 9 correspond to the verbal judgments “moderately more dominant”, “strongly more dominant”, “very strongly more dominant”, and “extremely more dominant” (with 2, 4, 6, and 8 for compromise between the previous values). Reciprocal values are automatically entered in the transpose position. We are permitted to interpolate values between the integers, if desired or use numbers from an actual ratio scale of measurement. The decision making theory known as the Analytic Hierarchy Process (AHP) uses the integers 1 to 9 as its Fundamental Scale of Absolute Numbers corresponding to the verbal statements for the comparisons [9]. When the contrast is beyond the scale values, the
x 1
x 1
x 1
x 1
x 1
measurements are done in stages. One groups things into clusters with a common pivot from one cluster to the adjacent one and still uses the same scale to compare and combine the relative values. Here is an example. A matrix of paired comparison judgments was used to estimate relative drink consumption in the United States. To make the comparisons, the types of drinks are listed on the left and at the top of Table 1, and judgment is made as to how strongly the consumption of a drink on the left dominates that of a drink at the top. For example, when coffee on the left is compared with wine at the top, it is thought that coffee is consumed extremely more and a 9 is entered in the first row and second column position. A 1/9 is automatically entered in the second row and first column position, because when the second drink is compared with the first, it has the reciprocal value. If the consumption of a drink on the left does not dominate that of a drink at the top, the reciprocal value is entered. Again in comparing coffee and water in the first row and eighth column position, water is
Fig. 2. Expansion of Human Necessities to show its subcriteria and priorities (local; global).
T.L. Saaty, E. Rokou / World Patent Information 48 (2017) 78e95
81
Fig. 3. Expansion of Performing operations to show its subcriteria and priorities (local; global).
consumed more than coffee slightly and a 1/2 is entered there. Correspondingly, a value of 2 is entered in the eighth row and first column position. At the left of Table 1, we see that the derived values and the actual values (obtained from various pages of Statistical Abstract of the United States) are close by nearly any measure of closeness. The scale has been mathematically derived from stimulus response theory and is not an arbitrary set of numbers used to compare homogeneous elements. It has been extended to cover a much wider range by grouping things into clusters and using a pivot element from one cluster to an adjacent one. The theory itself provides us with a compatibility index between the derived and actual outcomes without the need to use statistical theory for each calculation. We denote by x ¼ xi, and y ¼ yj respectively the derived and actual scale priorities, and by c ¼ cij
where cij is obtained as the element-wise product cij ¼ ðxi =xj Þðyj =yi Þ of one matrix of ratios of the two scales and the transpose of the other matrix of ratios. We then sum all the elements of C and divide by n2 to obtain the Compatibility Index number that represents deviation from perfect consistency of the two ratios. The index for the drinks example is 1.036. If the two vectors were identical, the index would be 1. The less compatible they are, the more the value will be above 1. 3. Summary of the mathematics of comparisons One can easily see that the ratio of two numbers from the same ratio scale is an absolute number. What is powerful about a ratio scale is that in normalized form it has the same values no matter
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Fig. 4. Expansion of Chemistry; Metallurgy to show its subcriteria and priorities (local; global).
T.L. Saaty, E. Rokou / World Patent Information 48 (2017) 78e95
what its original multiplier was. Thus two batches of bananas that weigh 3 and 6 kilograms on normalization, have the relative weights 3/(3 þ 6) ¼ 1/3 and 6/(3 þ 6) ¼ 2/3. These two batches also have the weight in pounds of 6.63 and 13.26 respectively. When normalized, these weights are again 6.63/(6.63 þ 13.26) ¼ 1/3 and 13.26/(6.63 þ 13.26) ¼ 2/3. Thus, when normalized, ratio scales are reduced to a standard form. Our approach is based on using absolute numbers which, unlike ratio scales which are invariant under a similarity transformation fðxÞ ¼ ax (for a constant a>0), are invariant only under the identity transformation fðxÞ ¼ x. We must filter or interpret the intensities of magnitudes of numbers in terms of our own sense of importance. In fact, we can use absolute numbers to construct a fundamental scale of priorities across all dimensions of experience by making paired comparisons of two elements at a time using the smaller or lesser element as the unit and estimating the larger one as a multiple of that unit with respect to a common property or criterion which they have in common. From such paired comparisons we can then derive an overall priority scale of relative importance for all the elements. Finally, we can combine such priority scales with respect to different criteria by weighting each scale by the weight of the corresponding criterion. We then add over the criteria to obtain a priority scale of measurement for all the elements with respect to all the criteria. The equations we encounter in deriving an absolute scale for pairwise comparisons in the case of a finite number of judgments are: n X
aij wj ¼ lmax wi ; i ¼ 1; :::; n
(1)
j¼1
83
that dominates all the other eigenvalues in modulus (as they may be complex conjugates), and the principal eigenvector which corresponds to the principal eigenvalue has real and positive components. He also proved that when A is raised to infinite powers, its columns converge to the principal eigenvector. Another German mathematician Georg Frobenius generalized the theorem to matrix that is nonnegative and the major difference between his result and that of Perron is that the principal eigenvalue may not strictly dominate but be equal to the next largest eigenvalue in modulus [10].
4. Criteria to weight inventions The priorities of different kinds of inventions depend on several criteria. Fig. 1 represents the top-level network of the Analytic Hierarchy Process model together with the criteria. Table 2 lists the relevant basic criteria groupings or clusters and the elements in each cluster. The top three levels of the hierarchical Inventions Prioritization Model are shown in Fig. 1. There are 8 main criteria nodes, which in turn have varying numbers of children nodes, some of which also have children nodes of their own. The 1.1 human necessities node is expanded to show those nodes (Fig. 2). For the detailed expansion of the other bottom level nodes, please see Figs. 3-9. The numbering convention is that the Goal node, in our case “Human survival, well being and satisfaction” gets a code composed of a single number “1”, its children nodes have a two number code 1.x, their children nodes a three numbers code 1.x.y where 1.x is the code of their parent, and the bottom level nodes a four numbers code 1.x.y.z. This is a ratings model in which the alternatives are the inventions that are to be prioritized. Ratings models consist of a
with aji ¼ 1/aij or aij aji ¼ 1 (the reciprocal property), aij > 0 (thus A is known as a positive matrix) whose solution is normalized so that n X
wi ¼ 1
(2)
i¼1
When aij ¼ aij ajk ; i; j; k; ¼ 1; :::; n the matrix A ¼ ðaij Þ is said to be consistent and its maximum eigenvalue is equal to n. The matrix A is called reciprocal if it only satisfies the condition aij ¼ 1=aji i; j ¼ 1; :::; n. Thus A may be reciprocal but not consistent. A is consistent if and only if aij ¼ wi =wj . If A is simply reciprocal and positive, but not consistent that is aij ajk saik does not hold for some i, j and k, then we must have:
aij ¼
! wi ε ; wj ij
εij ¼
1 ;ε >0 εji ij
(3)
A right eigenvector w is a solution of Aw ¼ lw and a left eigenvector y of A is a solution of the equation yA ¼ ly For a consistent matrix, the corresponding entries of the normalized left and right eigenvectors are reciprocals. We only use the eigenvector corresponding to the largest eigenvalue (of which there are n because A is of order n) known as the principal right eigenvector. The reason for that is because in making paired comparison judgments one must identify the smaller or lesser element and use it as a unit and then estimate how many multiples of that unit the larger element dominates it in value. We cannot tell what fraction of the larger element the smaller one is without first using it as the unit. Knowing that the left and right eigenvectors are reciprocals when we have consistency will be useful in the continuous case. The German mathematician Oskar Perron proved that if A has positive entries, its principal eigenvalue is always a positive real number
Fig. 5. Expansion of Textiles; Paper to show its subcriteria and priorities (local; global).
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Fig. 6. Expansion of Fixed Constructions to show its subcriteria and priorities (local; global).
hierarchical part, the goal, criteria, subcriteria and so on that are prioritized by pairwise comparisons in the usual way while the alternatives are rated for their performance on the bottom level criteria, the covering criteria, in a ratings spreadsheet. The criteria in the 2nd, 3rd and 4th level of the model are listed in Table 3 along with their local and global priorities, calculated by the method previously described. The priorities derive from a group decision process, where a group of experts were each given a questionnaire to make their pairwise comparison judgments about the importance of the criteria. An excerpt is shown in Fig. 10. For each judgment first the dominant factor is selected, then how strongly more dominant, using the 1e9 Fundamental scale [8]. This AHP questionnaire doesn't require the decision maker to all the pairwise comparisons of the model, as that would be quite large as there would be n*(n1)/2 questions to do all the judgments for every comparison set. The minimum number of judgments required is to have at least one judgment in every row and column, known as a spanning set; but a compromise shortened version that is a spanning set, but also
offers some redundancy is to fill out the 1st line plus the diagonal above the main diagonal of ones in the usual matrix view (Table 2). Because it is our hope to show the interested reader all the detail of our long and hard work on this subject, we have kept the tables that we used to ask people to compare the elements in the different levels of our hierarchy. Otherwise, we do not insist on keeping them if it is thought they should be taken out. There were 30 experts for this study. The people were asked to fill out the comparison judgments for the criteria and subcriteria. In the following tables are the matrices of judgments they had to fill out. Their final outcomes were synthesized by using the geometric mean as necessary when dealing with judgments. These are the local priorities listed as the first number next to each criterion. The global priorities, listed as the second number in the figures, were obtained by weighting and adding. However, the goal of the study is more to present a way to evaluate inventions and less to state which invention is more important. Because the judgments require use of reciprocal values it turns out mathematically that one needs to use the geometric instead of
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Fig. 7. Expansion of Mechanical engineering; Lighting; Heating; Weapons to show its subcriteria and priorities (local; global).
the arithmetic mean of the values entered by each decision maker for each question [10]. Local priorities result from pairwise comparing the children nodes with respect to their parent node and summing to 1.0. Global priorities are the local priorities weighted by the global priority of the parent node. The global priorities for the 1st and 2nd level are the same as the local priorities. As we just said, for the lower levels (3rd and 4th) the global priorities are calculated by multiplying the local priorities of the children nodes by the global priority of the parent. In Fig. 2, the expansion into the bottom level of sub-criteria is shown with the local and global priorities in parentheses. The priority of the Human Necessities node is 0.261; this is its local priority, and as its parent node is the goal node with a priority of 1, it is also its global priority. This special situation only applies to the first level of criteria in Fig. 1. In a ratings model priorities are established for the covering criteria (the bottom-most level of subcriteria) using pairwise comparisons then the alternatives are rated one at a time against them to establish their priorities. In this ratings model we used the same priority scale (see Table 4) for each covering criterion, and rated each alternative for its performance on
those criteria for which it deserved score. In Table 5 the ratings table for 13 selected inventions, the column headings, is shown. The criteria to which any of the inventions contributed were abstracted from the complete ratings spreadsheet. Each row represents a bottom-most level of subcriteria on which one or more of the alternatives got a score. The first column contains the global priorities of the respective criterions and there is one column for each of the inventions that are being rated. To calculate the final score (Table 6), the value of the rating is multiplied by the global priority of the criterion and summed for each invention. For example, to calculate the light bulb's score we have: 1*0.005 þ 1*0.006 þ 1*0.044 ¼ 0.055. The idealized value is calculated by finding the highest ratings score and diving by that all the entries. In the idealized score the invention with the highest score gets a value of 1.000. 5. Conclusions The first patent offices were founded in Europe. It was the first time that people had a written statement on how to grant patents.
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Fig. 8. Expansion of Physics to show its subcriteria and priorities (local; global).
It was decided that only innovations that are useful and genuinely novel, should be eligible for a patent. From that point on, the system of intellectual property has played an important role in generating economic growth and also encouraging inventors and entrepreneurs by ensuring that they can make money from their ideas. Only in 2010 the American Patent Office granted 244,358 patents out of the applications it examined [4]. Year by year the number of inventions submitted to the Patent Offices all over the world grows.
Although it is a very difficult task to classify and rate the submitted inventions there has been no way, to the best of these authors knowledge, to evaluate inventions based on their effect on human well-being and progress. To our knowledge this work breaks new ground about the numerical prioritization of all kinds of inventions because of the effort spent in structuring the process in a comprehensive hierarchy. Using this approach we were able to determine that inventions falling under the categories of Human
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Fig. 9. Expansion of Electricity to show its subcriteria and priorities (local; global).
Table 3a Comparisons of the first level. Human survival and well-being and satisfaction
(a)
(a) Human necessities (b) Performing operations; Transporting (c) Chemistry; Metallurgy (d) Textiles; Paper (e) Fixed constructions
(b)
(c)
(d)
(e)
1 1 1 1 1
Human survival and well-being and satisfaction
(a)
(a) Fixed constructions (b) Mechanical engineering; Lighting; Heating; Weapons; Blasting (c) Physics (d) Electricity
(b)
(c)
(d)
1 1 1 1
Table 3b Comparisons of the second level. Human necessities (a) Agriculture (b) Foodstuffs; Tobacco (c) Personal or domestic articles (d) Health; Life-saving; Amusement Performing operations; Transporting (a) Separating; Mixing (b) Shaping (c) Printing (d) Transporting (e) Micro-structural technology; Nano-technology Chemistry; Metallurgy (a) Chemistry (b) Metallurgy (c) Combinatorial technology
(a)
(b)
1 1 (a)
(b)
(c)
1 1 1 (a)
(b)
(c)
1 1 1 (a)
(b)
1 1 (a)
(a) Building (b) Earth or rock drilling; Mining
(a) Instruments (b) Nucleonics
(e)
1
Fixed constructions
Physics
(d)
1
(a) Textiles or flexible materials not otherwise provided for (b) Paper
(a) Engines or pumps (b) Engineering in general (c) Lighting; Heating (d) Weapons; Blasting
(d)
1
Textiles; Paper
Mechanical engineering; Lighting; Heating; Weapons; Blasting
(c)
1
(b)
1 1 (a)
(b)
(c)
(d)
1 1 1 1 (a)
(b)
1 1
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Table 3c Comparisons of the third level. Foodstuffs; Tobacco
(a)
(a) baking; equipment for making or processing doughs; doughs for baking (b) butchering; meat treatment; processing poultry or fish (c) tobacco; cigars; cigarettes; smokers' requisites
(b)
(c)
1 1 1
Personal or domestic articles
(a)
(a) wearing apparel (b) headwear (c) footwear (d) haberdashery; jewellery (e) hand or travelling articles (f) brushware (g) furniture; domestic articles or appliances; coffee mills; spice mills; suction cleaners in general Health; Life-saving; Amusement
(b)
(c)
(e)
1 1 1 1 1 (b)
(c)
1 1 1 (a) (b) (c) (d) (e)
(a) crushing, pulverising, or disintegrating; preparatory treatment of grain for milling (b) separation of solid materials using liquids or using pneumatic tables or jigs; magnetic or electrostatic separation of solid materials from solid materials or fluids; separation by high-voltage electric fields (c) centrifugal apparatus or machines for carrying-out physical or chemical processes (d) spraying or atomising in general; applying liquids or other fluent materials to surfaces, in general (e) generating or transmitting mechanical vibrations in general Separating; Mixing
(a)
(a) generating or transmitting mechanical vibrations in general (b) separating solids from solids; sorting (c) cleaning (d) disposal of solid waste; reclamation of contaminated soil
(b)
1 1 1
(c)
(d)
1 1 (a)
Shaping
(a)
(a) working or preserving wood or similar material; nailing or stapling machines in general (b) working cement, clay, or stone (c) working of plastics; working of substances in a plastic state in general (d) presses (e) making paper articles; working paper (f) layered products Printing
(b)
(c)
(d)
(e)
(f)
(g)
1 1 1 1 1 1 1 (b)
(c)
(d)
(e)
(f)
1 1 1 1 1 1
(a)
(a) printing; lining machines; typewriters; stamps (b) bookbinding; albums; files; special printed matter (c) writing or drawing implements; bureau accessories (d) decorative arts
(b)
(c)
(d)
1 1 1 1 (a)
(b)
(c)
(d)
(e)
1 1 1 1 1
Transporting
(a)
(a) aircraft; aviation; cosmonautics (b) conveying; packing; storing; handling thin or filamentary material (c) hoisting; lifting; hauling (d) opening or closing bottles, jars or similar containers; liquid handling (e) saddlery; upholstery
(b)
(c)
(d)
(e)
1 1 1 1 1
Micro-structural technology; Nano-technology
(a)
(a) micro-structural technology (b) nano-technology
(a) inorganic chemistry
1
1
(a) mechanical metal-working without essentially removing material; punching metal (b) casting; powder metallurgy (c) machine tools; metal-working not otherwise provided for (d) grinding; polishing (e) hand tools; portable power-driven tools; handles for hand implements; workshop equipment; manipulators (f) hand cutting tools; cutting; severing (g) working or preserving wood or similar material; nailing or stapling machines in general
Chemistry
1
1
Shaping
(a) vehicles in general (b) railways (c) land vehicles for travelling otherwise than on rails (d) ships or other waterborne vessels; related equipment (e) aircraft; aviation; cosmonautics
(g)
1
Separating; Mixing
Transporting
(f)
1
(a)
(a) medical or veterinary science; hygiene (b) life-saving; fire-fighting (c) sports; games; amusements
(d)
(b)
1 1 (a) 1
(b)
(c)
(d)
(e)
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Table 3c (continued ) Chemistry
(a)
(b)
(b) treatment of water, waste water, sewage, or sludge (c) glass; mineral or slag wool (d) cements; concrete; artificial stone; ceramics; refractories (e) fertilisers; manufacture there of
(c)
(d)
(e)
1 1 1 1
Chemistry
(a) (b) (c) (d) (e) (f)
(a) fertilisers; manufacture thereof 1 (b) explosives; matches (c) organic chemistry (d) organic macromolecular compounds; their preparation or chemical working-up; compositions based thereon (e) dyes; paints; polishes; natural resins; adhesives; compositions not otherwise provided for; applications of materials not otherwise provided for (f) petroleum, gas or coke industries; technical gases containing carbon monoxide; fuels; lubricants; peat Chemistry
(a)
(a) petroleum, gas or coke industries; technical gases containing carbon monoxide; fuels; lubricants; peat (b) animal or vegetable oils, fats, fatty substances or waxes; fatty acids therefrom; detergents; candles (c) biochemistry; beer; spirits; wine; vinegar; microbiology; enzymology; mutation or genetic engineering (d) sugar industry (e) skins; hides; pelts; leather
(b)
1 1 1 1 1
(c)
(d)
1 1 1 1 1
Metallurgy
(a) (b) (c) (d) (e)
(a) metallurgy of iron 1 (b) metallurgy; ferrous or non-ferrous alloys; treatment of alloys or non-ferrous metals (c) coating metallic material; coating material with metallic material; chemical surface treatment; diffusion treatment of metallic material; coating by vacuum evaporation, by sputtering, by ion implantation or by chemical vapour deposition, in general; inhibiting corrosion of metallic material or incrustation in general (d) electrolytic or electrophoretic processes; apparatus therefor (e) crystal growth Textiles or flexible materials not otherwise provided for
(a)
(a) natural or man-made threads or fibres; spinning (b) yarns; mechanical finishing of yarns or ropes; warping or beaming (c) weaving (d) braiding; lace-making; knitting; trimmings; non-woven fabrics (e) sewing; embroidering; tufting (f) treatment of textiles or the like; laundering; flexible materials not otherwise provided for (g) ropes; cables other than electric Building (a) construction of roads, railways, or bridges (b) hydraulic engineering; foundations; soil-shifting (c) water supply; sewerage (d) building (e) locks; keys; window or door fittings; safes (f) doors, windows, shutters, or roller blinds, in general; ladders
(e)
(a)
(b)
(c)
(d)
(e)
1 1
1 1 (f)
(g)
1 1 1 1 1 1 1 (b)
(c)
(d)
(e)
(f)
1 1 1 1 1 1
Engines or pumps
(a) (b) (c) (d)
(a) machines or engines in general; engine plants in general; steam engines 1 (b) combustion engines; hot-gas or combustion-product engine plants (c) machines or engines for liquids; wind, spring, or weight motors; producing mechanical power or a reactive propulsive thrust, not otherwise provided for (d) positive-displacement machines for liquids; pumps for liquids or elastic fluids Engineering in general
1 1 1 (a) (b) (c)
(a) fluid-pressure actuators; hydraulics or pneumatics in general 1 (b) engineering elements or units; general measures for producing and maintaining effective functioning of machines or installations; thermal insulation in general (c) storing or distributing gases or liquids Lighting; Heating (a) lighting (b) steam generation (c) combustion apparatus; combustion processes (d) heating; ranges; ventilating (e) refrigeration or cooling; combined heating and refrigeration systems; heat pump systems; manufacture or storage of ice; liquefaction or solidification of gases Lighting; Heating
1 1
(a) (b) (c) (d) (e) 1 1 1 1 1 (a) (b) (c) (d)
(a) refrigeration or cooling; combined heating and refrigeration systems; heat pump systems; manufacture or storage of ice; liquefaction or solidification of 1 gases (b) drying (c) furnaces; kilns; ovens; retorts (d) heat exchange in general
1 1 1
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Weapons; Blasting
(a)
(a) weapons (b) ammunition; blasting
(b)
1 1
Instruments
(a)
(a) measuring; testing (b) optics (c) photography; cinematography; analogous techniques using waves other than optical waves; electrography; holography (d) horology (e) controlling; regulating (f) computing; calculating; counting (g) checking-devices
1
Instruments
(d)
(a) checking-devices (b) signalling (c) educating; cryptography; display; advertising; seals (d) musical instruments; acoustics (e) information storage (f) instrument details
(a)
(b)
(c)
(b)
(c)
(d)
(e)
(f)
(g)
1 1 1 1 1 1 (e)
(f)
1 1 1 1 1 1
Electricity
(a)
(a) basic electric elements (b) generation, conversion, or distribution of electric power (c) basic electronic circuitry (d) electric communication technique
(b)
(c)
(d)
1 1 1 1
Fig. 10. Excerpt from the AHP questionnaire.
Necessities, Electricity, Mechanical Engineering and Physics are those that should be prioritized. Looking back on the data about the patents awarded in the last two centuries, most of them actually fall in these four categories. Finally, given a list of inventions from the last 100 years and asking a group of individuals to rate them using the proposed approach, we see how the different inventions have actually affected the people of this generation. For example inventions like the steam engine locomotive, that the new generation had never
Table 4 Rating scale used to rate the inventions against the covering criteria. Rating
Value
Very High High Medium Low Very Low
1 0.619 0.380 0.238 0.143
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91
Table 5 Ratings table of selected inventions. Only the criteria with global priorities greater than 0.0009 were included. Name
wheel clock traffic Global steam lights Priorities engine locomotive
light airplane radio bulb
tv
atomic cooking printing bomb stove
pacemaker computer
1.1.1. Agriculture
0.096
0
1.1.2.1. baking; equipment for making/ processing doughs; doughs for baking 1.1.2.2. butchering; meat treatment; processing poultry or fish 1.1.3.7.furniture; domestic articles or appliances; coffee mills; spice mills; suction cleaners in general 1.1.4.1. medical/veterinary science; hygiene 1.1.4.2. life-saving; fire-fighting
0.015
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
Very High 0
Very Low Very High
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0.020
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
Very 0 High
Very High Very High
0.005
0
0
0
0
Very 0 High
Very High
0
0
0
0.052
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
Very High 0
0.034
0
0
0.380952 0
1.1.4.3. sports; games; amusements
0.008
0
0
0
0
Very High 0
1.2.1.1. crushing, pulverising/ disintegrating; preparatory treatment of grain for milling 1.2.1.3. centrifugal apparatus/machines for carrying-out physical/chemical processes 1.2.1.5. generating/transmitting mechanical vibrations in general 1.2.2.2. casting; powder metallurgy
0.004
0
Very High Very High Very High
Very Low Very 0 Low 0 0 0
Very Low 0
0
Very High 0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0.003
0
Very High
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0.003
0
0
0.001
0
1.2.2.3. machine tools; metal-working 0.001 not otherwise provided for 1.2.2.4. grinding; polishing 0.001
0 0
0.002
0
Very High Very High Very High Very High Very High
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
Very Low
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0.002
0
Very High
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0.001
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0.005
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
Medium
0.002
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
Medium
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
High
0 Very High Very High 0
0 0
0 High
0 0
0 0
0 0
0 0
0 0
0 0
0
0
0 Very High 0
Very Low Very Low Very Low 0 0
Very High Very High Very High Very High Medium 0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
1.2.2.5. hand tools; portable powerdriven tools; handles for hand implements; workshop equipment; manipulators 1.2.2.7. working or preserving wood/ similar material; nailing/stapling machines in general 1.2.2.11. making paper articles; working paper 1.2.3.1. printing; lining machines; typewriters; stamps 1.2.3.2. book binding; albums; files; special printed matter 1.2.3.3. writing or drawing implements; bureau accessories 1.2.3.4. decorative arts 1.2.4.1. vehicles in general
0.002
0
0.001 0.006
0 0
1.2.4.2. railways
0.004
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
Very High 0
Very High High
0
Medium 0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
Medium 0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0.013
0
0
0
0
Very High 0
0
0
0
0
Medium
Medium
1.3.3. Combinatorial Technology
0.032
0
0
0
Medium 0
0
0
High
0.001
0
0
0
0
0
Very High 0
0
1.3.1.6. explosives; matches
Very High 0
1.3.1.9.dyes; paints; polishes; natural 0.001 resins; adhesives; compositions not otherwise provided for; applications of materials not otherwise provided for 0.002 1.3.1.10. petroleum, gas/coke industries; technical gases containing carbon monoxide; fuels; lubricants; peat
0
0
0
0
0
High
0
0
0
0
0
High
1.2.4.3. land vehicles for travelling 0.004 otherwise than on rails 1.2.4.4. ships/other waterborne vessels; 0.006 related equipment 1.2.4.5. aircraft; aviation; cosmonautics 0.004 1.2.5.1. micro-structural technology
0
0
0
0
0
0
Very High Very 0 High 0 Very High 0 0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
(continued on next page)
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Table 5 (continued ) Name
wheel clock traffic Global steam lights Priorities engine locomotive
light airplane radio bulb
tv
atomic cooking printing bomb stove
pacemaker computer
1.3.1.14. skins; hides; pelts; leather 1.3.2.1. metallurgy of iron
0.001 0.004
0 Very Low
0 0
0 0
0 0
0 0
0 0
0 0
0 0
0 0
High 0
0 0
0 0
1.3.2.2. metallurgy; ferrous or nonferrous alloys; treatment of alloys or non-ferrous metals 1.3.2.3. coating metallic material; coating material with metallic material; chemical surface treatment; diffusion treatment of metallic material; coating by vacuum evaporation, by sputtering, by ion implantation or by chemical vapour deposition, in general; inhibiting corrosion of metallic material or incrustation in general 1.3.2.4. electrolytic or electrophoretic processes; apparatus therefor 1.4.1.1. natural or man-made threads or fibres; spinning 1.4.1.3. weaving
0.003
0
0
0
0
0
Very High
Very Low 0
0 Very High 0
0
0
0
0
0.003
0
0
0
0
0
Very High
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0.004
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0.007
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0.008
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0.007
0
Very High Very High 0
Very 0 Low 0 0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
Medium 0
0
0.008
High
0
0
0
0
High
Low
Low
0
Low
Low
Low
Low
0.004
0
0
0
0
0
High
0
0
High
0
0
0
0
0.026
Low
0
0
0
0
High
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0.028
Medium
0
0
0
Very High High
0
0
0
0
Very Low Very Low
0
0 0 0
0 0 0
0 0 0
0 0 0
0 0 0
0 0 0
0 0 0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0 0 0 0 0 0
0 0 0 0 0 0
0 0 0 High 0 Medium
1.4.1.6. treatment of textiles or the like; laundering; flexible materials not otherwise provided for 1.6.1.1. machines or engines in general; engine plants in general; steam engines 1.6.1.2. combustion engines; hot-gas or combustion-product engine plants 1.6.2.1. fluid-pressure actuators; hydraulics or pneumatics in general 1.6.2.2. engineering elements or units; general measures for producing and maintaining effective functioning of machines or installations; thermal insulation in general 1.6.3.1. lighting 1.6.3.2. steam generation 1.6.3.3. combustion apparatus; combustion processes 1.6.3.4. heating; ranges; ventilating
0.006 0.003 0.003
0 0 Very High 0 0 0
0 0 0
0 0 0
1 0 0
0.005
0
0
0
0
0
0 0 Very High 0
1.6.3.7. furnaces; kilns; ovens; retorts
0.002
Low
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
1.6.4.1. weapons 1.6.4.2. ammunition; blasting 1.7.2. Nucleonics 1.7.1.1. measuring; testing 1.7.1.2. optics 1.7.1.3. photography; cinematography; analogous techniques using waves other than optical waves; electrography; holography 1.7.1.4. horology
0.004 0.004 0.047 0.006 0.003 0.002
0 0 0 0 0 0
0 0 0 0 0 0
0 0 0 0 0 0
0 0 0 0 0 0
0 0 0 0 0 0
High 0 0 0 0 0
0 0 0 0 0 Low
0 0 0 0 Low 1
1 1 1 0 0 0
Very Low Very Low 0 0 0 0 0 0
0.004
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
1.7.1.6. computing; calculating; counting 1.7.1.7. checking-devices 1.7.1.8. signalling 1.7.1.9. educating; cryptography; display; advertising; seals 1.7.1.10. musical instruments; acoustics 1.7.1.11. information storage 1.7.1.12. instrument details 1.8.1. basic electric elements 1.8.2. generation, conversion, or distribution of electric power 1.8.3. basic electronic circuitry 1.8.4. electric communication technique Ratings Score
0.005
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
1
0.006 0.003 0.005
0 0 0
0 0 0
Very High Very High 1 1 0
0 0 0
0 0 0
High 0 0
0 0 0 0 0 0 0.238095 0.619 0
0 0 0
0 0 High
0 0 0
0 0 0.619045
0.005 0.006 0.009 0.050 0.043
0 0 0 0 0
0 0 0 0 0
0 0 1 0 0
0 0 1 1 0
0 0 0 0 1
0 0 0 High 0
1 0.238095 0 0 0
0 0 0 0 1
0 0 0 0 0
0 0.380952 0 0 0
0 0 0 0 0
0 High 0 0 0
0.031 0.037
0 0
0 0
0 0
1 1
0 0
High 0
0 0 0 0.238095 0.381 0
0 0
0 0
0 0
0 High
0.030
0.178 0.027 0.166
0.060
0.062
0.025
0.096
0.070
0.055 0.183
1 0.381 0 0 0
0.072 0.117
T.L. Saaty, E. Rokou / World Patent Information 48 (2017) 78e95
93
Table 6 Rating inventions using the IPC model, the higher the rating score or the closer to one the idealized score the higher the importance of the corresponding invention based on the answers of the given experts, e.g. airplane (score 0.183) is thought to be slightly more important than the wheel (score 0.178). Invention
Ratings Score
Idealized
steam engine locomotive wheel clock traffic lights light bulb airplane radio tv atomic bomb cooking stove printing pacemaker computer
0.030 0.178 0.027 0.166 0.055 0.183 0.060 0.072 0.117 0.062 0.025 0.096 0.070
0.163 0.973 0.150 0.909 0.300 1.000 0.328 0.392 0.642 0.339 0.135 0.528 0.381
used or felt its effect in their everyday life, scored very low, while the wheel that we all think as one of the most important milestones in the history of humanity, scores very high along with the airplane that is felt now days as something essential.
Appendix. List of inventions evaluated
Field
Exemplary inventions
Agriculture Foodstuffs; Tobacco
plough, saw, reaper, fishing rod yeast, bread, oven freezer, tin cigarette, cigar, lighter coat, jean, shirt cap, crown, hairpin shoes, socks, tie, cravat, ring, necklace bag, wallet, suitcase brush bed, desk, table, cup, bowl, dish penicillin, aspirin, band-aid buoy, gas-mask, fire extinguisher sports equipment, cards, chess mill, grinder sheller, separator centrifuge sprayer shaker separator cleaner compactor puncher casting machine machine tool grinder, polisher scissors, screwdriver, hammer knife, axe chisel, nailing machine cement, clay kneader press machine papermaking technology inductance machine printer, typewriter stapling machine, folder ruler, pencil compass paint, platfond wheel, bike train, subway automobile, motorcycle ship, steamer airplane, shuttle, spaceship container conveyer belt tank, can
Personal or domestic articles
Health; Life-saving; Amusement
Separating; Mixing
Shaping
Printing
Transporting
(continued on next page)
94
T.L. Saaty, E. Rokou / World Patent Information 48 (2017) 78e95 (continued ) Field Micro-structural technology; Nano-technology Chemistry
Metallurgy
Combinatorial technology Textiles or flexible materials not otherwise provided for
Paper Building
Earth or rock drilling; Mining Engines or pumps
Engineering in general
Lighting; Heating
Weapons; Blasting Instruments
Nucleonics
Exemplary inventions horse's hoof, spur fibre material nanophase materials salt, sugar water filter glass cement, clay, china chemical fertilizer gun powder, match benzene, aldehyde chemical fiber colourant, paint gasoline soya-bean oil, penut oil alcohol, beer, vinegar sugar, starch leather iron, copper, aluminium alloy stainless steel electrolyze, electroplate quartz, diamond composite material cotton thread, yarn spinning machine loom knitting sewing machine, embroidery machine laundering rope, cable paper-making concrete, floorslab digger, soil shifter waterpipe, tap road, railway, bridge lock, key door, window well drilling engine, steamer diesel, gasoline engine wind engine, spring engine pump hydraulic press damper gas cylinder, liquid cylinder light steamer stove heater refrigerator dryer kiln airconditioner gun, tank TNT, A-bomb ruler, thermometer telescope, glasses camera, film watch, clock sensor calculator, abacus X-ray tester signal lamp LED piano, violin computer screw, semiconductor nuclear reactor integrated circuit thermal power, wind power capacitor, resistor telegram, radio
T.L. Saaty, E. Rokou / World Patent Information 48 (2017) 78e95
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