| In the “information economy,” we recognize the increasing availability of information. On the one hand, we can be intimidated by the overwhelming amount of information bearing down on us. On the other hand, we now have tools to enable us to garner great value from that information quite readily. New information products can better inform decision processes. As businesses are making decisions under tremendous competitive pressures, they increasingly seek better information.
This book addresses how to inform technology management by mining a particularly rich information resource—the publicly accessible databases on science and technology. These include amazing compilations of the world’s open R&D literature, patents, and attendant business and public aspects. This information, when integrated with other data sources (the Internet) and expert review, can improve decisions concerning development, licensing, and adoption of new technology.
“Tech mining” presents particular challenges. Most fundamentally, it uses information resources in unfamiliar ways. In the past, we searched abstract databases to find a few articles worth reading. However, when there are literally thousands of relevant articles or patents, we also need to present the “big picture.”This book helps understand the value in “profiling research domains,” mapping topic relationships, and discerning overall trends. This is a qualitatively different way to use technology information. |