Performance Evaluation of G7 Countries in Terms of Patent Applications

A patent is a legal right granted by a patent authority that gives the inventor or assignee exclusive rights to produce, use, sell and distribute an invention for a specified period of time. Patent acquisition offers numerous advantages related to the protection of inventions, enhancement of competitiveness, attraction of investors, generation of income, support for innovation, market expansion, and improvement of brand reputation for the individual or entity that holds the patent. Given the significance of the patent concept, the performance of the G7 countries regarding patent acquisition is handled as multi-criteria decision-making (MCDM) problem in this research. In the evaluation made over the total number of patent applications submitted over nine different technological domains between 2000-2020, the criteria weights were determined by MAXimum of Criterion (MaxC), Modified Preference Selection Index (MPSI) and LOgarithmic Percentage Change-driven Objective Weighting (LOPCOW) methods. By using these criteria weights which are combined with the Bonferroni Mean Operator, the MUltiple-TRIangles ScenarioS (MUTRISS) method was utilised for the performance rankings of G7 countries in terms of patent acquisition. As a result of the study, the success ranking of G7 countries in terms of patent applications was determined as USA, Japan, Germany, UK, France, Canada and Italy.