Sectoral strategic differences of technological development between electronics and chemistry: a historical view from analyses of Korean-invented US patents during the period of 1989–1992

Because R&D conducted in electronics and chemistry has made significant contributions to South Korean economic development, past strategies in technology developments in these fields are addressed. The possibility of capturing national technology strategy and policy characteristics from patent analyses is explored. For the analysis, data were analyzed from 557 US patents in electronics and 108 US patents in chemistry, registered by Korean inventors, between 1989 and 1992. Descriptive statistics of aggregated patent information were equivalently mapped to each strategy in the two fields. Industry-specific features and past technology strategies in electronics and chemistry are identified. Electronics was driven by the private sector, while chemistry was driven by the public sector. Inventors in both fields are seeking clustered innovation on which subsequent innovation can be accumulated and/or applied to numerous heterogeneous fields. Contrary to the stated assumption, many Korean electronic innovations were based on scientific outputs such as papers. Of the knowledge strategy variables, size of invention and number of heterogeneous classifications are considered to be an important factor that affects patent citation counts in both fields.