The measurement of innovation capability and competence of game software companies through patent indicators

In recent years, innovation has become the pursuing goal of enterprise. Gradually firms encounter the situation of “no innovation, no survival”; therefore, innovation is an essential consideration for high-tech industry and RD department. Innovation is not restricted only the development of tangible products; however, for game software industry innovation also includes the development and the design of game software products, the introduction of game production management. Innovation has brought an uniqueness for enterprises and this uniqueness could be a significant factor of creating competitive advantage. For game software producers nowadays, maintaining competence by simply developing new game does no longer exist. Firms found out that simply producing new games and enhancing high quality screen are no longer key factors to maintain competence. Only by constant innovation enterprises can increase advantages and raise profit. Patent represents the technology capability type and advantages of an enterprise. Though patent analysis, a firm is able to understand the technical expertise of each company and investigate the technical development track and enterprise arrangement of a specific industry. The more patent firms hold, the greater positive of competence they own. This study is based on a general approved patent indicator and we take patent application, the location of publication and gain into considerations. With the six patent indicators, including numbered patents, patent growth rate per quarter, cites per patent, current impact index, technology strength and technology life cycle, to evaluate the innovation orientation and competence of each firm.