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World Patent Information 28 (2006) 140–146

GB innovation since 1950 and the role of the independent inventor:An analysis of completed term patents

Brian Spear *

8 The Cedars, Buckhurst Hill, Essex, IG9 5TS, UK

Abstract

Historians and economists are agreed on the importance of technical invention and innovation in modern industrial societies but holdvaried opinions on the respective roles of corporations and independents. One reason is the difficulty of obtaining accurate quantitativedata, in the absence of which there is a strong tendency to fall back on entertaining if often misleading ‘‘heroic inventor’’ stories. Patentstatistics are extensive and freely available, if difficult to interpret for non-patent specialists, so a few researchers have used these toattempt to quantify invention and innovation, especially in the USA. The author has used statistics on GB originating completed termpatents to study the respective role of GB corporate and independent innovators since 1950. He concludes that, despite the rise of 20thcentury corporate research, of the order of a third of successful innovation still comes from independents judging by samples of GB pat-ents expiring in 1970 and 2003. However, this third comes from a steadily reducing pool of innovation corresponding largely to thedecline of GB manufacturing industry.� 2005 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Keywords: Patent analysis; UK innovation; Independent inventors; Corporate inventions; Completed term patents

1. Independent, corporate and heroic inventors

The Victorian GB Prime Minister Benjamin Disraeli said‘‘I hate definitions’’ and many historians and economistsseem to agree with him when discussing technical progresswhich makes interpretation very difficult [1]. However,being an ex-Patent Examiner, I strongly disagree and mydefinitions are detailed in the footnotes. This said, inventorscan be broadly divided into ‘‘independent inventors’’ and‘‘corporate inventors’’.1 However, much historical discus-

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* Tel.: +44 (0) 208 504 8972.E-mail address: brian_spear31@hotmail.com

1 An independent inventor (often called individual inventor) operatesoutside large corporations and endeavors to make money by patentlicensing, consultancy or entrepreneurship. Many run small businesses anda few, e.g. Sperry, eventually develop large corporations. Corporateinventors are employed by large organizations to conduct research,development and other technical functions and thus their inventions arisein the course of their work and, generally speaking, belong to theiremployer. These distinctions are not rigid, especially as independents oftensell or license their inventions to corporations for innovation whileemployees of corporations may become independents. Jewkes makes clear

sion is in terms of ‘‘heroic inventors’’, both independentand corporate.2 A considerable mythology arose aroundthe ‘‘heroic’’ independent inventor in the late 19th century[3] which arose, at least in part, as a reaction to attemptsto abolish patents in the 1850–1875 period in GB and else-where [4]. Retentionists promoted the idea of the inventoras a heroic achiever in need of special protection, i.e. pat-ents, and this heroic inventor image continued into the20th century, e.g. �the genius whose flashes of insight propelhuman history, as the archetypal Promethean, made in theimage of the Creator, a being in which God has placed a

that many inventors do not easily fit into either category but uses ascriteria for deciding: who chooses the field of ideas in which the inventorworks, who provides the resources for his work, and who stands to gaindirectly from his inventions [2].

2 Heroic inventor/invention is imprecise but usually has most or all ofthe following features: (A) the invention is considered to be a majorscientific/technological breakthrough, at least in retrospect if not at thetime, (B) it leads to successful innovation, i.e. a major financial success forthe innovator (if not the inventor) and (C) the inventor (who is usuallyindependent but can be corporate) acquires fame and often a mythologicalstatus (frequently at variance with the facts).

B. Spear / World Patent Information 28 (2006) 140–146 141

spark of His own creative power� [5]. There is probably apsychological need for great inventors but:

The popular belief in individual, single, great inventorsfor things has been grotesquely developed by the sameprocess as that which built all the classic mythologiesto account for the origins of this and that, so that ourtraditional great inventors, even when really great andthe doers of much of what is ascribed to them, are still,from another aspect, mythic heroes in our school-prop-agated national epos [6].

2. The rise of corporate research

The start of organized research in the German dyestuffsindustry in the 1880�s soon after the introduction of astrong patent system led to Whitehead�s famous observa-tion �The greatest invention of the 19th century was theinvention of the method of invention� [7]. However, corpo-rate research only became widespread after 1900, especiallyafter WW1 in the major industrialized countries. A com-mon belief among economists and historians of sciencesince the inter-war years is that well organized and financedcorporate research teams have marginalized the indepen-dent inventor in the business of invention and innovation.3

For example in 1943 Schumpeter, who was arguing that thedevelopment of the capitalist economy undermines theentrepreneurial or innovative function, said �Innovationitself is being reduced to routine. Technological progressis increasingly becoming the business of teams of trainedspecialists who turn out what is required and make it workin predictable ways� [9].

Galbraith argued along the same lines though admittingsome residual role for the individual:

In the planning system, innovation, like other activity, ishighly organized. The thing to be invented or theimprovement in process that is to be made is commonlysettled on in advance. The development, with rare excep-tions, is pursued in accordance with established timeta-bles and within approved budgets. The notion of totallyspontaneous invention by an individual deriving from abrilliant, innovating thought is not quite dead. It sur-vives in part because, being inexpensive and independentof organization, such invention is possible for the smallfirm and thus for the market system [10].

3 ‘‘Invention’’ and ‘‘innovation’’ are often very loosely used in generalparlance but I will use a definition which would be most generallyacceptable to intellectual property professionals [8]: �An invention is anidea, a sketch or model for a new or improved device, product, process orsystem. Such inventions may often (not always) be patented but they donot necessarily lead to technical innovations. In fact the majority do not.An innovation in the economic sense is accomplished only with the firstcommercial transaction as expressed in both involving the new product,process, system or device, although the word is used also to describe thewhole process.�

Those having socialist views tended to believe in thesuperiority of state planning including research, the primeexample of this being the USSR. Nevertheless the empiricalsupport for this belief in the superiority of planned researchis surprisingly sketchy.

3. Doubts about corporate research

These began to surface in the 1950�s, e.g. Jewkes in1958/1969 gave detailed case studies of significant twenti-eth century invention and innovation much of which orig-inated from outside corporate research; in his words �thesources of invention were numerous, scattered and varied�and he supported this using essentially heroic independentinventor/innovator stories [11]. Hamberg followed a simi-lar approach in 1963 [12]. Jewkes considered the essentialproblem is that �research cannot be directed in the normalsense� and that �the research organization may itself con-stitute an obstacle to the rapid acceptance and assimila-tion of new ideas offered to the firm from outsidesources� [13].

The underlying principle, rarely formulated preciselybut ever present, has been that originality can be orga-nized: that provided more people can be equipped withtechnical knowledge and brought together in largergroups, more new ideas must emerge; that mass produc-tion will produce originality just as it can produce sau-sages [14]. There is nothing in the history oftechnology in the past century and a half to suggest thatinfallible methods of invention have been discovered orare, in fact, discoverable [15].

The real problem is that, over the last 20–30 years, manycompanies have concluded they have received inadequatefinancial return on their investment. Mowery noted UScorporate research has been downplayed and the indepen-dent has gained increased prominence, especially in hightechnology fields like computers, telecommunications andbiotechnology:

US firms have since 1980 been embarked on a far-reach-ing series of initiatives in restructuring their industrialresearch activities. For much of the postwar period,large firms such as Du Pont or General Electric reliedheavily on central corporate research laboratories forthe basic research that they expected to serve as thefoundation for their commercial innovations. Manypost-1980 corporate initiatives, however, representefforts to ‘‘externalize’’ a larger fraction of their R&Dactivities. As a result, many central corporate researchlaboratories have been closed, and others have shrunkin size and as a share of corporate R&D spending [16].

There is thus currently a belief that corporate research isnot the complete answer and the independent is still impor-tant, but again it has little statistical backing. The pooreconomic performance and ultimate collapse of planned

142 B. Spear / World Patent Information 28 (2006) 140–146

economies like the USSR has been another blow to thecorporate research concept. Despite having impressivenumbers of research organizations (and no independents)their overall record of technical innovation was poor.

4. Evaluating GB innovation since 1950 using patentstatistics

Most research has been on the USA, the world�s mostsuccessful economy, but I found little quantitative researchon GB since 1950. However, the pattern of increasingcorporate research followed the US pattern e.g. applica-tions from companies (as opposed to individuals) steadilyincreased from 15% in 1913, 58% in 1938, to 68% in 1955[17]. By this stage independents appear to have been con-sidered more marginalized than in the USA [18]. However,as GB was the home of the Industrial Revolution and isstill a major economy, I considered it worthwhile to inves-tigate the sources of successful GB innovation by analysisof inventors using patent renewal statistics and thus avoidthe entertaining, if flawed, dependence on heroic inventorstories. As an analogy, studying the history of an armyby reading the citations of its few top bravery medal win-ners might reveal a mixture of fact and mythology but itwould not necessarily reveal much about the generality ofits soldiers or its overall effectiveness. However, althoughthese statistics are extensive, accurate and widely available,their interpretation is fraught with difficulty. As Jewkeshimself said:

Unfortunately, the relevance of patent statistics to whatis really happening in the field of invention is veryobscure. Indeed, were it not for the fact that no otherstatistical material exists the patent statistics wouldproperly be ruled out of court as useless. But, becausethere is no other quantitative material, and especiallybecause the patent statistics reveal a marked trend, itis natural enough to suppose that �some figures are bet-ter than no figures� [19].

Nevertheless I made certain assumptions:

(1) Inventions of any possible commercial significanceare usually the subject of a patent application(s).4

(2) Those inventions which might turn into innovation(i.e. products on the market place) usually proceedto granted patents several years later.

(3) Those patents which last to the end of their 20 yearterm (of the order of 10% of the original patent appli-cations) must be of commercial value to their ownersas the steeply increasing renewal fee gradient encour-ages owners to let valueless patents lapse. Hence these

4 The latest patents I considered were filed around 1983 so predatedmost problems with software , biotechnology, business methods etc. whichare debatably patentable.

full term patents, generally speaking, represent agood sample of successful innovation though thevalue of individual patents can vary widely [20].

None of these assumptions are original. Pakes andothers showed that the significant (i.e. commercially impor-tant) invention and innovation can be identified and stud-ied by looking at the small minority of granted full termpatents [21–23]. However, they do not specifically look atthe breakdown between independent/corporate GB inven-tors. I therefore did this by analyzing samples of GB orig-inating patents expiring in 2003 and 1970.

5. The research method briefly explained

GB and EP(GB) Patents expiring at the end of their 20year term are listed in the UK Patents and Design Journal(PDJ) published at the UK Patent Office web site and Ichecked all those for 2003. It has status information foreach patent and includes names and addresses of bothapplicants, inventors etc. and the history of the patent overits term including assignments legal actions etc. There werevery few cases where the inventor national origin wasuncertain.

Of the British origin minority some come from wellknown GB companies, e.g. ICI, GEC, or the GB subsidiar-ies of well known overseas companies e.g. Mars, Sonywhere the inventors were clearly GB. Others have the sameApplicant and Inventor throughout their existence and arethus clearly independent inventors (referred to as privateinventors as opposed to independents operating as smallcompanies).

The problem arises where the applicant is an unknownlimited company, many successful independents clearlyoperating as such. A free search of the GB CompaniesHouse database and/or a quick internet search revealeddata on most, many having their own web sites giving com-pany history etc. Some were subsidiaries of major compa-nies while others are long established (i.e. pre WW2)small/medium firms which I did not consider to be inde-pendents). However, some have clearly been formed asone man bands in the last 40 odd years (though they mayhave grown considerably since or become part of largegroups later) so, if they were independent and fairly small20 years ago I considered them to be independents. Patentsfiled by NRDC (now BTG) are assumed to have originatedfrom either independents or government sponsoredresearch so have been listed separately. NRDC was startedin 1948 to help GB inventors (especially governmentresearchers) transform invention into innovation but onlya handful of patents resulted in profitable innovation andthey had a very low success rate with independents [24].There remained a minority not found on the internet so Ichecked manual sources e.g. trade directories. Virtuallyall those quickly turned out to be very small companiesand thus independents by my definition. There remain

Table 12003 sample: inventors by country, and GB inventors by type, for GB patents

GB private inventors 3.28%GB small companies 5.24% Total GB independent inventors 8.52%GB Corporate inventors 12.34%NRDC 0.84%GB not clear 1.27% Total GB inventors 23%US inventors 23.78%JP inventors 6.64%DE inventors 6.2%Other non-GB inventors 12.39% Total non GB inventors 77%

Table 22003 sample: inventors by country, and GB inventors by type, for EP(GB)originating patents

GB private inventors 0.16%GB small companies 0.8% Total GB independent

inventors 0.96%GB Corporate inventors 5.16%NRDC 0.08%GB not clear 0.28% Total GB inventors 6.49%US inventors 31.89%JP inventors 24.71%DE inventors 14.93%Other non-GB inventors 21.95% Total non GB inventors 93.51%

B. Spear / World Patent Information 28 (2006) 140–146 143

applicants where insufficient data could be found or theirstatus was unclear (e.g. universities) so I have called these‘‘GB not clear’’ though some may be independents.

The 1970 sample data was not fully computerizedthough sufficient can be found from the esp@cenet� data-base which includes data from Inpadoc. Similar techniqueswere used though, given the length of time elapsed morewere ‘‘not clear’’.

6. The 2003 sample

This comprised 4352 GB and EP(GB) patents whichexpired at the end of their full term (i.e. filed around1983). These were processed under the GB 1977 PatentsAct which extended the term to 20 years and introducedother changes, e.g. searching for inventive step, whichmake this sample not strictly comparable with the 1970sample which was processed under the GB 1949 Act. Ofcourse many patent applications, especially from largercompanies, now use the European/PCT routes and endup as EP patents designating GB–EP(GB) as discussedbelow.

The breakdown of GB patents that completed their 20year term in 2003 and were thus presumably of commercialimportance to their owners is shown in Table 1.

It is no surprise that over three quarters are of non-GBorigin. The decline of GB manufacturing industry and thegreat increase in manufactured imports has been noted forover forty years and the patent statistics merely confirmthis. What is more surprising is that the GB independentinventor is still well represented, producing around 37%of the total GB originating patents which reached theend of their term as opposed to 53.6% for the corporateinventors. In fact many of the �GB not clear� come fromsmall companies (albeit often established before WW2)and some of the NRDC total probably come from indepen-dent inventors too (e. g. some were filed by individuals withNRDC added later) so the real total is probably around40%. Of course this is 40% of a small percentage (23) ofthe overall total and thus it might be argued that GB cor-porate inventors are either not very productive or mostlyobtain GB protection via the EP route, especially for thecommercially important innovation. I therefore effectedthe same exercise for the full term EP(GB) patents. Asexpected the expense of the EP route and the priority given

to protection in the GB home market means that the num-ber and proportion of GB originating EP(GB) patents islower than for GB, as shown in Table 2.

As the EP is a larger market one would expect the GBoriginating percentage to be lower but this sample showeda very low GB percentage, less than half that of Germanyfor example. Nevertheless, though only about 15% of GBinventors are independents they are still significant despitethe greater expense.

7. The combined GB and EP(GB) 2003 sample

Thus, looking at the GB originating patents, the inde-pendents produced 30.6% of the total as opposed to 60.4for the corporate inventors (Table 3). However some ofthe �GB not clear� or NRDC are probably independentstoo so the real total is probably of the order of a third ofcommercially important innovation from independentinventors. Of course this is only a sample of one year�spatents filed around 1983, and, given the basic assumptionsand ambiguities in deciding whether some GB patenteesare independent or corporate inventors (within my defini-tions), this figure can only be a very approximate estimate.There is no evidence to show that independent or corporateinventors are more or less likely to keep their patents inforce for the full term.

8. The 1970 sample: comparison with the 2003 sample

These were originally filed around 1953/4 when condi-tions had returned to normal after WW2 and 4800 of these

Table 41970 sample: inventors by country, and GB inventors by type

GB private inventors 7.36%GB small companies 5.07% Total GB independent

inventors 12.43%GB Corporate inventors 17.18%NRDC 0.49%GB not clear 8.67% Total GB inventors 39%

(rounded)US inventors 27.49%DE inventors 11.94%FR inventors 6.54%Other non-GB inventors 15.22% Total non GB

inventors 61% (rounded)

Table 5GB originating patents: comparison of 1970 and 2003 samples

GB originatingindependent inventors

Total GB orginatinginventors

Number Percentage Number Percentage

1970 sample of611 GB patents

76 12.43 237 39

2003 sample of4352 GB andEP(GB) patents

185 4.2 594 13.7

Table 32003 sample: inventors by country, and GB inventors by type, for both GB patents and EP(GB) originating patents

GB private inventors 62 + 4 = 66 1.5%GB small companies 99+20 = 119 2.7% Total GB independent inventors

4.2% GBCorporate inventors 233 + 127 = 360 8.27%NRDC 16 + 2 = 18 0.41%GB not clear (rounded) 24 + 7 = 31 0.71% Total GB inventors 13.7%US inventors 449 + 786 = 1235 28.37%JP inventors 654 + 607 = 1261 29.02%DE inventors 117 + 368 = 485 11.14%Other non-GB inventors 234 + 541 = 775 17.80% Total non GB inventors 86.3%Total patents 1888 + 2464 = 4352

144 B. Spear / World Patent Information 28 (2006) 140–146

expired at the end of their full term in 1970.5 Comparedwith the 2003 sample there was less international patent fil-ing and, in particular, few Japanese patents were filed inEurope. Hence a higher percentage would be expected tobe of GB origin. However, the interesting statistic is thepercentage originating from GB independent inventors asa baseline for comparison with that in the 2003 sample. Itook a sample of 611 patents from the 4800 (approx.12.7%) and the results are shown in Table 4.

Not surprisingly even then most applicants came fromoverseas, especially US and DE. Nevertheless 31.9% ofthe GB originating patents were from independent inven-tors as opposed to 44% from corporate inventors. Never-theless despite the greater difficulties of classification, it isclear that of the order of a third of the GB originating pat-ents covering commercially important innovation camefrom independents in the early 1950�s.

Thus, of the GB originating patents from the samples ofboth 1970 and 2003 representing patents originally filedaround 1953 and 1983 respectively, of the order of a thirdin both cases came from independent inventors, althoughthe GB originating patents dropped severely in overall num-bers and percentage over the intervening period (Table 5).

Thus, despite the predictions of Schumpeter and others,the independent has apparently continued to be a signifi-

5 These were notified weekly in the GB OJP (Official Journal Patents).This is the forerunner of the Patents and Designs Journal and is availablein hard copy form in the Patents Section of the British Library in London.

cant force in GB originating invention and innovation overthe last 50 years and shows no sign of being marginalized.Technically independents were found over a wide area,with the exception of chemistry/pharmaceuticals wherelarge companies are particularly dominant. Although afew heroic inventors appeared in my samples, e.g. theMoulton bicycle, the vast majority of significant inventionand innovation is of a more prosaic (unheroic) naturewhich does not necessarily involve large material resourcesand can often be developed by individuals and small com-panies. Thus heroic inventor stories are very misleading inthis context.

However, the GB 1998 Innovation Trends Survey noted:

a depressing picture of a continued decline in expendi-ture by UK firms in support of innovation as reflectedin the exploitation of new technology, process innova-tion, supply chain integration and development of abroad innovation strategy. Overseas firms located inthe UK have a more positive attitude to new technolo-gies and process innovation than indigenous onesdespite all the efforts of the CBI (Confederation ofBritish Industry) and others to change attitudes [25].

Unfortunately, from a British perspective, my resultstend to confirm a long term decline in innovation by bothGB corporates and independents.

9. Why does the independent inventor survive—His

character perhaps?

Given modern opportunities available to work in corpo-rate research it appears surprising that anyone wishes to

B. Spear / World Patent Information 28 (2006) 140–146 145

attempt the lonely and difficult path of the independent.The answer seems to lie mainly in the character of inven-tors and their adjustment, or otherwise, to the demandsof the corporate environment. As Jewkes points out:

6 The full quotation is �I often feel, and ever more deeply I realize, thatfate and character are the same conception� [34].

despite many exceptions, inventors are very much a typewhether they work inside or outside an institution. Noone who has studied their lives or who has had contactwith them can seriously doubt this statement. The inven-tor is absorbed with his own ideas and disposed to mag-nify their importance and potentialities. He tends to beimpatient with those who do not share in his consumingimagination and leaping optimism. He runs to griev-ances and feels them sharply . . . . . .The world is againsthim, for it is normally against change and he is againstthe world, for he is challenging the error or the inade-quacy of existing ideas [26].

Those who work in the patents business would certainlyrecognize the type. Their obsessional temperament fre-quently extends to eccentricity e.g. patents on perpetualmotion machines or bodily functions such as excretion orsex [27] and it is often suggested that inventors have astreak of lunacy though two psychiatrists concluded that�scientific creativity requires a firm base of knowledge,and that psychopathology, when present, can only colourthe process of invention; it cannot in itself produce strengthout of weakness. In other words, the only creative ‘‘madscientists’’ are those that were creative scientists before theybecame mentally ill� [28,29].

Another noticeable feature of inventors, especially inde-pendents, is how few are women. Though there havealways been female patentees, they reached a GB peak ofaround 2% of the total in 1898 (at the height of the cyclingboom) [30]. In the 1950�s GB female inventors averagedabout 1% [31] and very few appeared among my samplesof independents though there were more among corpo-rates, especially in chemistry. Like independent inventing,playing chess seems to attract the same type of obsessionalmale personality which often extends to eccentricity (as akeen chess player I have seen many examples!). In bothcases very few women seem attracted to the lifestyle.

Unfortunately large bureaucratic organizations tend toselect and promote staff for their ‘‘well rounded’’ qualities(i.e. their conformity, loyalty to the corporation and abilityto get on with their peers) and corporate research labsoften reject creative minds for the ‘‘well rounded’’ person.In particular, Whyte asked �how good are the corporations�scientists�, concluding that few distinguished scientistsworked there and those that did were in a handful offamous ones, especially GE and Bell Labs., which gavetheir staff wide freedom in their research. He argued thatthe good researchers tended to be independent mindedindividuals whose overriding interest was their work ratherthan the organization that employed them and, by exclud-ing such people, research quality suffered [32].

Generalization is dangerous but among independentsthere is often a strong component of single minded obses-

siveness, often extending into eccentricity or worse, whichtranscends any hopes of monetary rewards and often leadsto abrasive interpersonal relationships. They often fit verybadly into corporate bureaucracies where short term finan-cial payoffs and not rocking the boat have high priority.However, outside this framework such obsessiveness issometimes a positive asset in bringing ideas to fruition.To quote Dyson, the famous GB inventor/innovator ofthe cyclone vacuum cleaner: �I have been a misfit through-out my professional life, and that seems to have worked tomy advantage� [33]. The undoubted innovative success ofmany independents may thus lie less in the nature of theiroriginal invention, or in the material resources available toexploit it, but more in the character of the inventors whoare frequently not typical of other men. �Character isdestiny� as Novalis put it.6

Acknowledgement

This article is based on the Author�s Dissertation for theM.Sc. in the History of Science, Medicine and Technologyat Imperial College London University 2004. Many furtherreferences to related background articles and books areavailable in this dissertation.

References

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[33] Dyson J. Against the Odds. London: Orion Business Books; 1997.p. 11.

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Brian Spear is a Chartered Engineer and Fellowof the Institution of Electrical Engineers whosecareer was spent in the UK Patent Office. Thisincluded 22 years examining patents relating tocomputers, control systems and telecommunica-tions. He has also spent 10 years on developingcomputer databases/searching, working in theircommercial search arm—the Search and Advi-sory Service, and on IPR lecturing to a wide rangeof organisations. Since retiring he has completedan M.Sc. in the History of Science, Medicine and

Technology at Imperial College London.