60,000
5000 10,000 15,000 20,000 25,000 30,000 35,000 40,000 45,000 50,000 55,000
0
USA
Percent Change (2006 to 2010)
-13%
19% Japan
Germany
3%
213% 63%
South Korea China
2006 2007 Source: World Intellectual Property Organization (2010 data estimated) YEAR Figure 1: International Patent Filing Chart.
manufacture. I defi ne that product, perform a basic design, and send it out to be manufactured elsewhere. As it is being manufactured, the person or persons who are manufacturing it realize that, perhaps, one of the parts is available in a smaller, or newer version; or cheaper; or a version that now provides better performance. So the manufacturer might be looking at this product and thinking, “I could make this product smaller, I could make this product cheaper, and I could make this product more in line with newer technologies. More importantly, I could create a whole new
product based upon what I see from your idea, and another idea that somebody else has given to me, and merge those two things.” So now, by way of innovation, this manufacturer has created something new from something that is already invented, and thus he has essentially created something that is actually brand-new. The outsourcer is entirely out of the loop.
Keeping the creative and innovative ‘edge’ comes
from the whole process, ongoing, whereby you see a problem, you take what's in front of you and work with that to develop a solution. I can cite the
September 2011
history of our own company as an example. We have developed a reputation for being able to build very rugged products, hardened electronics products, and that development came directly from solving problems expressed in the needs of our customers, and then designing the product that would do the job. For example, a customer might come to us and say, “Here's my specifi cation, I need this product to basically be dropped from a rooftop and survive.” The way that one approaches the problem is
to design something that is expected to meet that requirement, surviving a drop from the rooftop, then engineer it and keep reengineering it until it can fi nally be dropped from the rooftop and remain functional, making engineering changes and adjustments as needed until it meets specifi cations. Over the years, even over decades, what we've
learned here at the company is that solving problems in product development builds an experience and knowledge base that can later be leveraged to solve other problems as they come along, e.g., more demanding challenges, more complex and sophisticated products. Of course, when one encounters a problem that
www.electronicscomponentworld.com /
www.electronicproductionworld.com EIU 33 2008 2009 2010
International Patent Filings
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