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- More than 10% of Ford’s approximately 20,000 active patent families, are related to the implementation of digital technologies and have above average Technology Relevance™ as measured by LexisNexis PatentSight.
- One of Ford’s clear patent strength areas is security, safety and communication of vehicles and passengers.
These and many other insights are from a study of the top 100 global Innovators identified in a November 2019, EconSight study. EconSight is a Swiss-based consulting and research company who created the ranking use LexisNexis PatentSight to analyze patents owned by global companies that are leaders in innovation in the digital space. This study revealed that Ford’s consistent efforts in innovation have resulted in their ranking being improved five spots within a year. They lead the rank hierarchy in autonomous driving, closely followed by the VW group, Toyota Motor and Bosch. LexisNexis PatentSight’s webinars are fact-filled and fascinating for anyone interested in patent analytics. Their next one is coming up shortly and you can register here for the next one scheduled for February 13th.
Following the lead of Innovation study, in order to understand more about technology adoption in the automotive industry, LexisNexis PatentSight conducted further analyses – comparing Ford’s portfolio to that of Volkswagen, Alphabet and Apple, who are also active in the automotive space. To maintain consistency, the analysis was limited to patents owned by these companies that relate to a combination of classic and digitization technologies to be used in automobiles. Key insights from the study include the following:
In addition to consistently increasing their portfolio size in digital technologies since 2013, Ford’s patents have also been performing extremely well with regard to the PatentSight overall strength metric, Patent Asset Index™. Figures 1 and 2 illustrate that Ford has been focused on increasing its foothold in key digital technologies since 2013. Between 2013 and 2018, for every 2 patents that were filed by Alphabet in these technologies, Ford filed for a little over 3 patents. In the case of Apple and Volkswagen, Ford filed more than 3 times and 2 times as many patents as they did during the same time period.
Sources: https://www.forbes.com/sites/louiscolumbus/2020/02/09/ford-is-learning-fast-from-alphabet–apple-how-to-compete-with-patents/#3ef443406b20