A Challenge to the Coherent Intellectual Property and Standardization Strategies into the IoT Era

—A comparison of the strategies of intellectual property and standardization between the Japanese and US/European corporations

Abstract

This article starts with two major discussions of the Japanese strategy of intellectual property (IP) and standardization, one is the "Sanmi-ittai" strategy, the trinity of business, R&D and IP strategies, and the "Open and Closed" strategy. While the majority of Japanese corporations could not be fully successful in accommodating these strategies, the new SEP (Standard Essential Patents) discussion aroused. Because the limited exposure of Japanese corporations in smartphone market, the SEP discussions have been limited to the injunction issue Japanese corporations missed a good opportunity to revisit the value of the inherent strategies of IP and standardization in junction with business strategy. While this discussion has not been fully appreciated, the new challenge came from the emergence of IoT (Internet of Things). In the IoT era, the landscape of the IP and standardization strategies have to be changed. To meet this change, the "Outbound" IP strategy and "Outbound plus Top Layer" standardization strategy are proposed.