The Government Patent Register: A new resource for measuring U.S. government-funded patenting

Daniel Gross and Bhaven N. Sampat

Research Policy, 2025, vol. 54, issue 1

Abstract: We introduce new historical administrative data identifying U.S. government-funded patents since the early twentieth century. In addition to the funding agency, the data report whether the government has title to the patent (“title” patents) or funded a patent assigned to a private organization (“license” patents). The data include a large number of “license” patents that cannot be linked to government funding from patent text or other sources. Combining the historical data with modern administrative sources, we present a public, consolidated data series measuring U.S. government-funded patents — including funding agencies — through 2020, and we provide code to extend this series in the future. We use the data to document long-run patterns in U.S. government-funded patents and federal patent policy, propose ways in which these data can be used in future research, and discuss limitations of the data.

Keywords: Public R&D; Patents; Patent policy; Patent data (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: N42 N72 O31 O34 O38 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2025
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

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Related works:
Working Paper: The Government Patent Register: A New Resource for Measuring U.S. Government-Funded Patenting (2024)
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:respol:v:54:y:2025:i:1:s0048733324001914

DOI: 10.1016/j.respol.2024.105142

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