A new dataset to study a century of innovation in Europe and in the US

• Published in: Research policy Vol. 53; no. 1; p. 104903
• Main Authors: Bergeaud, Antonin, Verluise, Cyril
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Elsevier B.V 01.01.2024
• Subjects: History of innovation; Text as data; Text as data; Patent; Y10; History of innovation; N90; O30
• ISSN: 0048-7333; 1873-7625
• DOI: 10.1016/j.respol.2023.104903

Innovation is an important driver of potential growth but quantitative evidence on the dynamics of innovative activities in the long-run are hardly documented due to the lack of data, especially in Europe. In this paper, we introduce PatentCity, a novel dataset on the location and nature of patentees from the 19th century using information derived from an automated extraction of relevant information from patent documents published by the German, French, British and US Intellectual Property offices. This dataset has been constructed with the view of facilitating the exploration of the geography of innovation and includes additional information on citizenship and occupation of inventors. •PatentCity: A novel dataset on German, French, British and US patents published since the 19th century•PatentCity was created using automated extraction of information from patents, including inventor's citizenship and occupation.•The dataset allows researchers to understand the geography of innovation and the long-term drivers of innovative activities.•The paper presents ideas for future research using PatentCity.•Data are openly available and can be used freely by any researchers.