利用專利分析評估半導體企業的技術定位與發展—以快閃記憶體MLC技術為例

Abstract

知識經濟時代中任一企業欲轉型為知識產業，皆須做好專利開發的工作，因為唯有企業充分地體認到專利的重要性，並且了解如何開發專利以創造企業營收，才能在知識經濟中立於不敗之地。因此，如何一方面擴充具有價值之專利數量，另一方面尋求專利價值化之可行方案，最後回饋到未來技術之創新與產品開發，乃是企業進行專利開發之主要目標。本論文將以快閃記憶體MLC技術為例，分兩方面探討： 消極面：專利分析(Patent Analysis) 根據半導體產業技術發展的現況與趨勢擬定專利檢索策略，配合專利檢索工具以進行目標屬地國專利資料庫之前案（目標專利群）檢索。接著，利用專利分析工具，以圖表化的呈現方式將目標專利群轉化為專利地圖，其中藉由經營圖表（如技術生命週期圖、歷年專利數量圖、發明人分析表、專利引用表、專利引證表等）以廣泛地瞭解相關技術的發展脈動以及瞭解競爭敵手的動向；藉由技術圖表（如技術功效矩陣圖、專利家族圖、重要專利引用族譜圖等）以瞭解專利權利佈局現況以及獲得侵權警訊；最後，根據專利地圖解析半導體產業專屬專利情報，以成為特定企業經營決策或產品研發之重要技術文件。 積極面;專利組合(Patent Portfolio) 根據半導體產業技術發展現況，配合特定企業專屬專利地圖以及專利情報以尋找核心技術。接著，以核心技術為中心，將核心技術與前案進行可專利性的比對，以協助該企業建構在特定核心技術領域的專利組合。同時探討適合的專利申請策略，以積極補強技術面之不足，使其他競爭對手無法利用專利迴避（Design Around）進入市場。

In the knowledge economic era, any enterprise want to turn into the knowledge industry ,the patent development should be well done. Because only the enterprise can fully understand the importance of patent and know how to develop patents for increasing it’s revenue, then it can be successful in the knowledge economic era. Therefore, increasing the number of valuable patents and commercializing the patents, contribute to the development of innovative new technologies and products, it’s the major enterprise’s goal of patent development. This paper take the MLC technology of flash memory as example, and develop it in two way: Passive way : Patent Analysis Base on the technology trend of semiconductor industry ,the strategy of patent search can be defined; Co-operating with patent searching tool, we can proceed the target patents’ searching of the designed country. Then ,we use patent analysis tool to summarize the target patents by graphic table or display. The management charts ( for example ,technique life cycle chart、annual total patent number chart、inventor analysis chart、patent reference chart、patent citation chart….etc.)can help us to know the developing trend of the specific technique and understand the status of competitors; The technique charts( for example, technique function matrix chart, patent family chart, key patents reference family chart..etc) can help us to know the overall management of patent application and the tort warning; Finally, base on the dedicated patent information of the semiconductor industry from the patent map, the specific enterprise can make it’s management decision and take patent information as the important technique references. Active way : Patent Portfolio According to the technique development of the semiconductor industry, using the dedicated patent map and information of the specific enterprise , we may get the core technology. Then, we set the core technology as the target and compare it with the prior art , thus we can build up the patent portfolio in the target technique area. And we can make the suitable patent application strategy to compensate the insufficient part of the prior art, thus the competitor can’t design around and enter the market.