Business value through knowledge management

In these straitened times, companies looking to save money would be well advised to consider a knowledge management platform, suggest Edward Keyes and Jason White.

Overview

The semiconductor industry is technology-intensive and a prolific user of the patent system. Of the top 10 patent filers in the United States, seven (IBM, Samsung, Panasonic, Toshiba, Sony, Intel, Seiko-Epson) have a significant portion of their business in the semiconductor area.

Of the 718,835 patent applications awaiting first office action in the US patent office, nearly one-fifth falls into the category of Semiconductor, Electrical, Optical Systems & Components. The 2009 top 10 ‘pure’ semiconductor companies by revenue have been granted a total of 65,708 US patents in the last 10 years. The graph opposite shows distribution by the individual assignee.