Developement of the Patent Prioritization Model using the Electre Method and Analytic Hierarchy Process: A Case Study of Technology Selection in a Cellphone Company

With the advent of growing knowledge of the economy and the rapid growth of technology, intellectual property has become the focus of attention of corporate investment managers and researchers. Patent are considered to be the most important intellectual asset, and one of the reasons for this is the extensive research that has been done on the various dimensions of these rights. The patent provides the possessor with the possibility to use the technology exclusively for a limited period (often twenty years). Since many industrial and service companies need to acquire new technologies by the purchase of patent rights to maintain their competitive advantage and sustained business growth, the issue of patent assessment has become a serious challenge in the field of technology. In this research, a model for evaluating and ranking patents based on multi-criteria programming methods is presented and then the resulting model is implemented in a cell phone company. The company is required to choose a technology from four technologies: (1) a dual display, (2) missing phone tracking, (3) wireless communications security, and (4) remote banking to develop its products. The implementation of the model is based on four main criteria: (1) the essence of technology, (2) the cost of technology, (3) the product market, and (4) the technology market in the company led to the choice of wireless security technology. Also the accuracy of the result obtained from the implementation of the research model has been confirmed by the method of ELECTRE.