Competitive Intelligence Analysis of Augmented Reality Technology Using Patent Information

Augmented reality has recently achieved a rapid growth through its applications in various industries, including education and entertainment. Despite the growing attraction of augmented reality, trend analyses in this emerging technology have relied on qualitative literature review, failing to provide comprehensive competitive intelligence analysis using objective data. Therefore, tracing industrial competition trends in augmented reality will provide technology experts with a better understanding of evolving competition trends and insights for further technology and sustainable business planning. In this paper, we apply a topic modeling approach to 3595 patents related to augmented reality technology to identify technology subjects and their knowledge stocks, thereby analyzing industrial competitive intelligence in light of technology subject and firm levels. As a result, we were able to obtain some findings from an inventional viewpoint: technological development of augmented reality will soon enter a mature stage, technologies of infrastructural requirements have been a focal subject since 2001, and several software firms and camera manufacturing firms have dominated the recent development of augmented reality.