Crucial Language based Challenges of

Patent Searching

In world fastest growing IP industry, to make effective patent searching, every patent searcher
must know the crucial language based challenges and due to complex, rich and inconsistent nature
with a huge vocabulary and numerous synonyms make English language more problematic.
Some major challenges of English language need to consider when performing searching are

Terminology:

Inconsistency in terminology as either dictionary synonyms was used, or abstract and

creative ways were used to describe the same technology across patents. Terminology can
take time to be accepted, and sometimes those popular in early years fail to be accepted
in the end. New concepts are particularly difficult as often many different words are used
until one or two terms become accepted.

Examples:

For automobile in between 1895 to 1900 in US and UK they used the words horseless
carriage or horseless vehicle, and its improved with time and in early 1900 most of
the use word automobile for patent filing but still there is use of words horseless
carriage or horseless vehicle in lower amount.

For bicycles during 1893 to 1900 for US and British patents they used velocipede and
bicycles in equal proportion but in 1901 to 1910 velocipedes had dropped to lower.
Cycle is also used to describe bicycle and also other cycles in chemical processes.
2015 - IntellectPeritus Services | Confidential

+91-261-311-2404

+1-832-426-3606

+44-208-123-0830

info@intellectperitus.com

Much slower terminology changes occur in aviation industry. The most frequent words
used in titles were flying machine, aeroplane, air ship and aerial vessel. Another thirty
different words were used like aerodrome, aerial wheel, aerial craft, wind motor,
aeronautic apparatus, aerodart, aeromotor and aerial top. The first use of the term
aircraft was in 1914 and airplane appeared in 1919.

Patentese:

Intelligent patent attorneys used a different way to draft a patent which is not easily
searchable through normal way.

Examples:

There are different views of person on the half / full water glass, pessimists would say
that glass was half empty; optimists would say that it was half full and patent
attorneys would describe it in his own way: an open ended cylinder horizontally
bisected by liquid H2O. So we must have to keep Patentese in mind when we building
a search query & perform searches.

Innovation AU patent (Circular Transportation Facilitation Device) by John Keogh get

the patent on wheel by smartly drafting following abstract: A transportation facilitating
device for facilitating transport of goods and persons. In particular, the device relates
to a circular object which enables such goods and persons to be held above a surface
and simultaneously moved with respect to the surface approximately parallel thereto.

Innovation US patent (Device for extracting elements from cavities, which uses a bag
for extraction and an applicator) by Jorge also get the patent for delivering a baby
from the womb, which main CPC class was A61B17/446 defined as obstetrical forceps
without pivotal connections, e.g. using a vacuum.

Synonyms (Similar Technology Terms):

Synonyms are main challenges in searching because for the one particular technology
terms there are many words can be used to describe that particular technology in a
different ways.

Sometime many most common words are there for the synonyms you need to use in
search, but at that time number of result are increase so you may remove some synonyms
but you cant be sure that terms you removed are not used by any patentese, so there is a
chances of missing the important result which is relevant.

Selection of the synonyms according to the particular technology is the main challenging
task for patent searchers.

2015 - IntellectPeritus Services | Confidential

+91-261-311-2404

+1-832-426-3606

+44-208-123-0830

info@intellectperitus.com

Examples:

Actual patent abstract from one of GB patent (Safety cap for a ball point pen) A cap for
a ball point pen includes a truncated end which is pierced by an aperture. The aperture
provides an air passage so that respiration can continue should the cap be swallowed
and become lodged in the throat. Above abstract is clear but there is no mention about
children which is very helpful. So it can be written as: A writing instrument with a
pierced cap that fits over the writing end, so that a child who is choking can still
breathe.

There are many other synonyms examples

1. Mobile such as telecommunication, telephone, cellular phone, cellphone,
phone, PDA, personal digital assistant and so on. These different words give
the unique results itself.
2. Pen such as Ball Point, Ballpoint, Writing Instrument, Writing Implement,
Writing Device and Writing Equipment.
3. Drug such as medicine, prodrug, pro-drug, medicament, pharmaceutical
formulation and pharmaceutical composition.

Spelling Mistakes (Typo Error or Typographical Ambiguities):

A. Keywords Spelling Errors

Different patent offices of worlds received patent data from different countries inventors
or assignees or attorneys and then they have entered the data of patent into centralize
database, during that time period there are major chances of the spelling mistakes.

Sometime there is an extra space (one or two) in the spelling of word which makes them
not searchable. This can be a very major problem for the searcher if that particular word of
technology is misspelled in whole patent, so there are maximum chances of missing that
relevant patent using the normal word searching.

Indexing errors emerge from OCR processing patent applications, because similar looking
letters such as e versus c, I versus l or 1, n versus ri, o versus 0, q
or g versus 9 and m versus rn are likely to be misinterpreted.

With the advent of electronic patent application filing, the number of patent reexamination
steps was reduced. As a consequence, the chance of undetected spelling errors increases.

Examples:

Separate and Seperate

Peice and Piece

Equiptment and Equipment

Spirt and Spirit

Dairy and Diary

Column and Colum

2015 - IntellectPeritus Services | Confidential

+91-261-311-2404

+1-832-426-3606

+44-208-123-0830

info@intellectperitus.com

Hygiene and Hygene, Hygine, Hiygeine, Higeine, Hygeine

Vacuum and Vaccuum, Vaccum, Vacume

Stationery (office supplies) and Stationary (motionless)

Gold club and Golf club [On QWERTY keyboards the d and f are next to each other, so
they can easily be transposed].

B. Assignee Spelling Errors

While performing assignee based search there is also major problems with the spelling
mistakes and if we dont know the possible variations of spelling mistakes, definitely we
will miss that patent easily while searching.

Companies often have branches in different countries, where each branch has its own
company suffix, e.g., Limited (United States), GmbH (Germany), or Kabushiki Kaisha
(Japan). Moreover, the usage of punctuation varies along company suffix abbreviations:
L.L.C. in contrast to LLC, for example.

Examples:

Whirlpool Corporation and Whirpool Corporation

Esso and Exxon

Koninklijke Philips and Koninklijke Phillips

Koninklijke Philips and Koninkl Philips

Nippon Steel Corp and Nipon Steel Corp

Hitachi Ltd and Hittachi Ltd

Whetherford International and Weatherford International

Emulecks Corporation and Emulex Corporation.

Machine Translation:

Main problem of machine translation is when you are searching on other languages which
are filed in the domestic languages like Japan, Korea and China without any INPADOC
family members in English language. Sometimes main important technology terms are not
translated. More seriously some terms are not exact equivalents of each other and nominal
words have different meaning in English, French and Germen.

Sometimes machine translation is not done based on the particular technology domains
but its depending on the general translation rule which majorly affect the searching.

Noun & Verbs of Words:

In English there are many words with nouns and verbs both, and other meanings are not
always obvious. Think about the possible meaning of nouns and verbs of words like oil,
driver, dye, ground, train, can, rifle, down, back, store and cook. This may sound like a
minor problem, but the different meanings can affect the results.
2015 - IntellectPeritus Services | Confidential
+91-261-311-2404

+1-832-426-3606

+44-208-123-0830

info@intellectperitus.com

Again adding context such as a classification or other words usually removes the problem,
but not always. Take to ship or shipping. Both words can either mean ships, or moving
cargo on trains or lorries, when ships are not relevant.

Compound Nouns:

Patent attorneys write the compound noun as per their understanding so there is huge
problem because there is multiple compound nouns used and spelt differently. Due to
variations in compound noun number of results must be vary in search databases.

Examples:

Wheelchair rather than Wheel chair

Heatsink rather than Heat sink or Heat-sink

Sodium Phenylbutyrate rather than Sodium PBA or NaPBA

Ball point is more popular than Ballpoint

Triglycerides rather than Tri-glycerides

Semiconductor rather than Semi-conductor.

Hyphens do not help, as they are treated as spaces by databases and hence mean
separate words.

Words with Different Spellings:

Country wise patentese draft the patent with variation in spellings and which are often only
known to those in the same industry.

Examples:

Aluminium, Alumininium, Alumina and Aluminum

Program and Programme

Vapour and Vapor

Sulfur and Sulphur

Color and Colour

Ageing and Aging

Diarrhoea and Diarrhea

Moisturiser and Moisturizer

Dialects or Linguistics:

Dialects also known as the Faux Amis or false friend which means words that appears to
be the same in French and in English but have a different meaning in terms of phonology,
grammar, vocabulary and by its use by a group of speakers. They are problem when
building a search query, searching and analyzing in foreign language.

2015 - IntellectPeritus Services | Confidential

+91-261-311-2404

+1-832-426-3606

+44-208-123-0830

info@intellectperitus.com

Example of Faux Amis

1. In French Location does not mean places to visit, it means rental,
2. Grape is bunch not a fruit for eating,
3. Confection refers to preparing of clothing not dessert or sweet and
4. Coin doesnt mean money, it means corner.

Many times we are rely on context but sometimes a search will give us a negative results
as context is only apparent with the results, not in search terms.

Homophones (Different Spelling with Same Pronunciation):

Due to same pronunciation of English words it is easy to misspell them such as buy and
by, cell and sell, right and write and so on.

Example: Words with same pronunciation but which are spelt quite differently

Steel and Steal

Cereal and Serial

Cede and Seed

Poor and Pour

Hole and Whole

Rain and Reign and Rein

A real problem is in the words inflammable and flammable, both means burning. As in
prefix in English often means not as in invalid versus valid.

Homonyms (Same Word Different Meanings):

Sometime spelling of words is similar but their meanings are different from each. While
some such meanings are related, often they are not.

Examples:

Light means either an absence of weight or illumination

Oil which can be petroleum or be put on food

Plane which can be an aircraft or a horizontal surface

Cycle which can be a bicycle or a stage in a process

Gas is used for petroleum (gaseous fuel) or vapour

Oil well obviously contains oil, but a well with no context is probably a water well

Christmas tree means oil pumping equipment rather than Christmas festival (25th
December).

2015 - IntellectPeritus Services | Confidential

+91-261-311-2404

+1-832-426-3606

+44-208-123-0830

info@intellectperitus.com

Contronyms (Words with Opposite Meanings):

Some words with two opposite meanings.

Examples:

Clip means to fasten or detach

Cleave means to adhere (join together) or to separate (divide)

Fast means quick or stuck or made stable

Quantum means significantly large or a minuscule part

Scan means to peruse or to glance

Skinned means covered with skin or with the skin removed.

Different Words:

There are many different words such as hood and bonnet, trunk and boot, parking lot and
car park, rubber and eraser, cell phone and mobile phone, gasoline (or gas) and petrol,
elevator and lift, sidewalk and pavement. Sometimes the searcher is not aware that there
is a distinctly different word to be used can cause problems.

Syntax:

Arrangement of words in patent is a minor problem as few search exclusively for long
phrases. Searching for three word phrases is generally sufficient. Adjacency operators
looking for words within five words are more than sufficient in English to cover all order.
Sometime you need to decide what order is most suitable to cover the important
technology results.

IntellectPeritus team undergoes with rigorous search training and we have unique
search model which overcomes challenges of patent searching and effective search
strategies leading us towards completion of 100 % patent searching. Our search model
is combination of keywords based searching, patent classification searching, citations
searching

and

assignee/inventors

searching.

In

given

limited

time

period,

IntellectPeritus search model provides results claiming towards 100 % completion of

search.

References:
1.

Do you know English? The challenge of the English language for patent searchers by Stephen van Dulken in 2014.

2.

The Impact of Spelling Errors on Patent Search by Benno Stein, Dennis Hoppe and Tim Gollub in 2012.

2015 - IntellectPeritus Services | Confidential

+91-261-311-2404

+1-832-426-3606

+44-208-123-0830

info@intellectperitus.com

About IntellectPeritus

IntellectPeritus is a global Knowledge Process Outsourcing (KPO) Consulting company,

founded by seasonal professionals with solid technical expertise and with experience of working for
technology-leading

organizations

in

various

technology

domains

for

decade

of

years.

IntellectPeritus is providing value added services to a global clientele including law firms,
technology corporations, start-ups, venture capitalists, patent brokerage firms and individual
inventors.
Specialties of IntellectPeritus are Patent Research & Analytics, Patentability, Novelty, Preexamination,

Prior-art,

State-of-the-art,

Freedom-to-operate,

Right-to-use,

Clearance,

Domination, Infringement, Right-to-make, Invalidation, Validation, Opposition, Due-diligence,

Patent watch, Technology Landscape Analysis, Competitive Analysis, Portfolio Analysis, Portfolio
Benchmarking, Technology watch, Competitor watch, Technology Trend Analysis, White-space
Analysis, Patent-to-Product Mapping, Product-to-Patent Mapping, etc
IntellectPeritus providing providing excellent quality of analysis clubbed with Innovigence
Coronium & Innovigence Corona to all our clients, with only goal to fill the gap between quality
analysis and interpretation of conclusive results to make smarter business decisions by
providing Innovative Intelligence (Innovigence), that you can trust.
For more details, visit our website https://intellectperitus.com

2015 - IntellectPeritus Services | Confidential

+91-261-311-2404

+1-832-426-3606

+44-208-123-0830

info@intellectperitus.com