Certainly, I do not (and cannot) argue that patent analytics are a panacea for the ills of business. But, in today’s fast-moving, global business environment, it cannot be controversial to contend that business intelligence is a critical need. Patent information collected and analyzed in the correct business context can provide a valuable addition to a company’s arsenal of business tools. Patent information can illuminate what products and technologies your competitors seek to exclude your company from making, using or selling by obtaining patent protection in that space. Indeed, by definition, what your competitor seeks to keep your company from doing is critical competitive information that should be deployed in your company’s business decisions. Your company also needs to know whether your current or future patent spend is directed toward maximizing payback in your corporate innovation investment. Patent information collected in the right way—that is, collected in a manner that generates actionable business insights—can provide a relatively low cost way to obtain this critical business information.
So, viewed from a different perspective, the backlog in the patent office could be seen as good news for your company. Companies that recognize and act on the information available from mass of patent filings will gain competitive advantage that is invaluable in today’s business environment.
Makes sense, millions of people have ideas out there doing nothing with them, lot of them try to file and then find out it’s too expensive, too complicated or time consuming, or they call those “Inventors” commercial hotlines on tv and they basically take the idea off their hands, gotta be more ways to scam people out of their ideas… Einstein probably did his best work reviewing the physics ideas of other people. Personally I like patent troll companies the best, they are really coming into their own these days and could probably start buying up people’s patent applications, that is people could apply for the patent and get the first to file rejection letter and then see if the patent troll wants it and all rights to finish the patent application.