The capability of the EU R&D Scoreboard companies to develop Advanced Manufacturing Technologies. An assessment based on patent analysis

In this report the main results of the study performed in the context of the Advanced Manufacturing for Competitiveness Project are presented. This project aims at developing and testing a methodology based on patent analysis to assess the capacity of the EU R&D Scoreboard companies to develop advanced manufacturing and key enabling technologies which are expected to have a major impact on the productivity, the efficiency, the profitability and the employment in major industrial sectors. The companies listed in the R&D Scoreboard hold a dominant position in KETs and AMT filings with about 61% of total KETs filings and 57% of total AMT filings in 2011. European companies hold almost 50% of the AMT related patent filings and about 50% of these are from Germany headquartered companies. Japanese based companies are responsible for 27% of the AMT filings worldwide and the US for about 24% of all transnational AMT patents. In KETs Japanese companies are dominating the scene, followed by Europe and the USA. Developing and patenting AMT and KETs related technologies seems to become more expensive over the time period under study as the decrease in the average patent intensity since 2004 shows. Larger firms have lower patent intensities than smaller ones and the patent intensity is higher in industry than in the service sector. European firms have the highest patent intensities followed by North American, Asian and companies from the rest of the world. R&D expenditures and patent filings are significantly positively correlated to the number of employees. This correlation is also observed in the case of firms who file AMT patents, larger firms are thus filing more AMT related patents compared to smaller ones. With regard to employment growth, however, we find no significant effect of KETs or AMT filings. The largest shares of KETs related filings are found in the Electronic & Electrical Equipment and Chemicals sectors. Firms in the Electronic & Electrical Equipment sector are also responsible for the largest shares of filings in AMT. Large shares, however, can also be found in the Industrial Engineering sector followed by the Automobiles & Parts and General Industrials sectors.