Patent citation analysis as a tool for analysing industry convergence

The main goal of this paper is to provide conceptual lens for analysing and anticipating the stages of convergence. Patent data include citations to previous patents and to the non-patent literature. These citations open up the possibility of tracing technological trajectories of the industries. The paper uses patent citation data of the paper and electronics companies as a test environment to evaluate the importance of technological interfaces as a source of new radical innovations and industry transformation. Patent data was collected from the 84 main players operating in the radio-frequency identification value chain. The test environment of selected patent data base is only used to use, develop and illustrate the patent analysis tools for researching convergence of industries. Overall results from the study are that the citation analysis method shed light of the technology competitive arena. The presented patent citation methodology provides new insights to the analysis of industry evolution, technological innovations and business development related to converging industries and technologies. Further research is needed to understand more deeply the relations and interaction between different stages in the convergence or fusion process.