Manually created applicant grouping and search
The search for the SIP-Standard and for manually created applicant groups is only available in the Invention Navigator Premium.
Automatically grouped applicants
Manual applicant grouping simplifies your work when carrying out searches for and analyses of applicants which are regularly searched or observed via a patent monitoring.
Prior to being able to search for manually created applicant groups, these groups must be created.
The applicant grouping can be created from any title list.
Example: Carry out any search. Once your result list is displayed, select the menu item “Applicant Grouping” in the menu tab “Tools” or select the red icon (factory symbol) in the menu. A new window will open.
The list displayed on the left
The Invention Navigator automatically analyses the entire result list and displays a list of all automatically grouped names, sorted by frequency of occurring patent families. By clicking on the column header (applicants in result set) Fam.Res. (Family Results), Fam All (All families in the database) the list can be sorted. The column “Fam. Res.” displays, how many with this automatically grouped applicant name occur in the result list. “Fam. All” displays, how many families with this standardised name occur in SIP’s entire world wide database (search4ip).
Click the Plus-icon and all spellings of the company names combined in this group are displayed.
The list of grouped applicants can at times be quite extensive. Use the filter on top of the list to clarify your results. Enter a name or part of a name in the text field and the list will be filtered accordingly and only automatically grouped applicant groups containing the filter in the name are displayed.
With the check box underneath the list you can select to show/hide applicants which are already assigned to a group. Check / uncheck the box in front of: “Hide applicants which are already in the group”
Automatically grouped applicants already assigned to a manually created group are displayed blue. An automatically created group or individual applicant names can be filed in multiple manually created groups.
Creating applicant groups
In the right part of the window the groups manually created by you or your colleagues (see. Sharing manually created applicant groups – available soon) are displayed.
In order to create an applicant grouping, proceed as follows:
In the left column, select one or more automatically grouped applicant names. (Ctrl + mouse click, SHIFT + mouse click) and, using drag-and-drop, transfer your selection to the right side of the window. A group with the selected name is automatically created. If you don’t want to transfer all the applicant names combined via the automatic applicant grouping to a group, proceed by only selecting the desired applicant names (Ctrl + mouse click, SHIFT + mouse click) and transfer your selection to the group.
Alternatively click “Create new group”, assign a name for the group and transfer automatically created groups or individual applicant names into the newly created group using drag-and-drop.
Filter, search in manually created groups
In order to get a better overview of the manually created applicant groups you can also filter your group for relevant names. Enter the name of the applicant group into the text field “Filter” and only the groups containing your filter will be displayed. This critically simplifies the assigning process.
In order to find applicant names in the groups, use the search field on the right (Search). When you enter a search term, only groups will be displayed containing this term.
Delete, edit manually created applicant groups
Manually created applicant groups can be deleted by selecting the group with mouse click (Ctrl + mouse click, SHIFT + mouse click to select multiple groups) and clicking the button “Delete group”. To delete applicant names from an applicant group, expand the group by clicking on the Plus-icon. Select the applicants to be deleted and open the context menu using right click. Select “Remove applicant from group” and delete all selected applicants from the group.
To move an applicant name from one group to another, use drag-and-drop to transfer the applicant name to the desired group. Once the groups have been created, they are available to use in the applicant search.
Sharing manually created applicant groups
Manually created applicant groups can be shared among the users in your network. From Invention Navigator Portable 2.4 these groups can be used by colleagues in R&D for search queries.
When creating an applicant group you can determine if the group is shared among the users of your network and if users are allowed to edit the group.
Procedure when creating a group
When clicking the button “Create new group” a new window will open. Check the box “Make group visible in my network”. If you want other users in your network to be able to edit the group (i.e. add / delete applicant names, change the group name) also check the box “Allow other users to edit this group”. This selection will then apply to all users within your Knowledge Network. You can subsequently change the rights for the individual users.
Changing rights of existing groups
To change the rights of existing groups, select the group via mouse-click and open the context menu via right-click. In the context menu select “Set permission”.
A new window will open where you can set the rights for individual users which user can access this applicant group with which rights.
Here the following permissions can be assigned:
| Read Permission | The user can see this group and can use it for a search. |
| Write Permission | The user can see this group and use it for a search. Applicant names can be added/deleted to/from the group. The name of the applicant group can be changed. |
| Admin Permission | See “Write Permission”. Additionally the rights for other users can be set. |
Tab Group permissions
Here you can set which groups can access the created applicant groups. The groups were previously created by the Knowledge Network administrator in your company with the Knowledge Network Administration Tool and contain defined rights for specific folders and the comment and evaluation function of the Invention Navigator. By selecting Read/ Write/ Admin permission all members of the group receive the respective rights.
Tab User permissions
Here you can set which specific users have permission to access the selected applicant group. Select one or more members of your Knowledge Network and assign the respective permission by checking the boxes.
Tab Effective permissions
This tab is used to get an overview of the permissions assigned previously to specific users. No changes can be performed in this tab.
All authorized users (including users of the Invention Navigator R&D) can access these manually created applicant groups. In the search mask the shared groups can be accessed via the “Grouping” button.