Title: Patent citations and value: through the lens of a social network approach

Authors: Feng Zhang; Guohua Jiang; Xiaoyun He

Addresses: The Pennsylvania State University Abington, 1600 Woodland Rd., Abington, PA 19001, USA ' Department of Management, College of Business Administration and Public Management, West Chester University, 700 S. High St, West Chester, PA 19383, USA ' Department of Information Systems, AUM College of Business, Auburn University at Montgomery, 310G Clement Hall, Montgomery, AL 36124, USA

Abstract: Identifying valuable technological inventions in a timely manner for further development and commercialisation has important strategic implications for organisations to maximise social welfare and return on investments. Building upon the advantages that social network approach can predict performance in short investigation periods, this study develops a conceptual and novel framework to predict patent value through analysing patent citations network structural indicators. Our proposed approach helps alleviate truncation problems suffered by existing patent evaluation methods. Testable propositions are also offered. This study contributes to patent economics literature and research fields that would benefit from a more accurate measure of valuable technological inventions. The proposed approach also has practical and commercial values to research institutes and industrial firms.

Keywords: patent value; social network approach; backward citation networks; forward citation networks; comprehensive citation networks.

DOI: 10.1504/IJMNE.2018.095118

International Journal of Management and Network Economics, 2018 Vol.4 No.2, pp.115 - 143

Received: 11 Sep 2017
Accepted: 27 Nov 2017
Published online: 01 Oct 2018 *

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