Baek Byung-yeul is a journalist at The Korea Times focused on cultural content, including films and cultural events in South Korea. You can contact him at baekby@koreatimes.co.kr to share your insights.
LG Innotek develops AI-based patent analysis system
LG Science Park in western Seoul, where LG Innotek's headquarters is located. Courtesy of LG Innotek
By Baek Byung-yeul
By Baek Byung-yeul
LG Innotek CEO Jeong Cheol-dong / Courtesy of LG Innotek
LG Innotek has built a patent analysis system based on artificial intelligence (AI) technology, as part of its bid to map out its research and development (R&D) direction better, the electronics parts affiliate of LG Group said Tuesday.
Companies generally collect and analyze patent information to decide how they will develop new products or new technologies. Through their patent analysis systems, companies check to see that there is no similarity between their products or technologies and existing ones, for the purposes of protecting intellectual property and avoiding possible risks.
However, LG Innotek said that its patent analysis system could become a “paradigm changer,” as it helps the company quickly analyze information by extracting which data is important and which data is worth ignoring.
“Our patent analysis system can analyze the information of tens of thousands of patents in a short amount of time ― something that was not possible with ordinary manpower ― and provide the key information required to establish the company's R&D direction. Beyond its traditional job of avoiding risks and protecting intellectual properties, the system serves as a leading indicator of our R&D strategy,” LG Innotek said.
LG Innotek said that the system can process 50,000 pieces of patent data in four hours, which is about 900 times faster than humans can. It further noted that this speed is possible thanks to its AI-based context-aware technology, which is being co-developed with LG Group's AI Research.
“The context-aware model can analyze the text and context of patent documents in real time, and quickly extract key information. By continuously developing its data classification ability, the model helps the system quickly conduct patent analysis,” LG Innotek said.
Thanks to the system, LG Innotek claimed that the company is now able to analyze more than 3 million pieces of patent data every year to find out technology trends and establish a long-term R&D strategy.
“Patent information is a leading indicator, showing what the future industry and market will be like. Companies that can utilize the big data they accumulated from across the world will be able to take the lead in technology,” Kang Min-seok, the executive vice president and chief technology officer of LG Innotek, said.
“LG Innotek will continue to introduce differentiated technologies and products that take advantage of AI, big data and digital transformation technologies,” Kang added.