Claim and control: The functions of patents in the example of Berkel, 1898–1948

Abstract

This article tries to provide a balanced view of firm patenting. Two different literatures provide two different functions of patents: patents enable a firm to claim a technology and they enable a firm to control that technology and to control markets. This article argues that claim and control are complementary functions, and that both need to be taken into account, but also that control gains in importance over time. It does so with a case study of the Dutch firm Berkel (Van Berkel's Patent) in the first half century of its existence. Berkel was a large and leading company in the development of meat slicing machines and compiled an extensive portfolio of patents.

Keywords:

• patents
• mechanical engineering

Acknowledgements

This paper is a spin off from the research programme The Co-evolution of the Dutch Knowledge Infrastructure and Innovations in Dutch Business, which is sponsored by the Dutch Organization for Scientific Research (NWO) and is embedded in the research programme Business in the Netherlands in the Twentieth Century (BINT). Earlier drafts of this paper were presented at the EBHA conference in Glasgow in August 2010, and the research seminar of the Nijmegen Center for Innovation Studies, in September 2010. Comments, suggestions and encouragement from participants in those events are warmly acknowledged.

Notes

 1. ‘Machine voor het snijden van vlees’, 16 June 1929 (NL20300). Patents are referenced by title, publication date, and publication code.

 2. Machlup and Penrose, ‘The Patent Controversy in the Nineteenth Century’.

 3. Ibid., 10–28; Mazzoleni and Nelson, ‘The Benefits and Costs of Strong Patent Protection’; Andersen, ‘If ‘Intellectual Property Rights’ is the Answer’.

 4. Van Dijk, ‘The Economic Theory of Patents: A Survey’.

 5. Teece, Managing Intellectual Capital.

 6. Long, ‘Patent Signals’.

 7. For an overview of the theoretical literature, and a study of licensing in Europe: Gambardella, Giuri, and Luzzi, ‘The Market for Patents in Europe’.

 8. Kitch, ‘The Nature and Function of the Patent System’.

 9. Hurmelinna, Kyläheikoa, and Jauhiainen, ‘The Janus Face’.

10. Teece, Managing Intellectual Capital, 11–26.

11. Overview: Bessen and Meurer, Patent Failure, 95–119.

12. Arundel and Kabla, ‘What Percentage of Innovations are Patented?’; Levin et al., ‘Appropriating the Returns from Industrial R&D’; Cohen, Nelson, and Walsh, ‘Protecting Their Intellectual Assets’.

13. Rivette and Kline, Rembrandts in the Attic, 15; Parchomovsky and Wagner, ‘Patent Portfolios’.

14. Hall and Ziedonis, ‘The Patent Paradox Revisited’.

15. Shapiro, ‘Navigating the Patent Thicket’.

16. Bessen and Meurer, Patent Failure.

17. Hall and Ziedonis, ‘The Patent Paradox Revisited’; Parchomovsky and Wagner ‘Patent Portfolios’.

18. Lamoreaux and Sokoloff, ‘Inventors, Firms and the Market for Technology’; Hughes, ‘Making Dollars Out of DNA’.

19. Swanson, ‘The Emergence of the Professional Patent Practitioner’; Guise-Richardson, ‘Redefining Vulcanization’; Beauchamp, ‘Who Invented the Telephone?’.

20. Reich, ‘Lighting the Path to Profit’. Also: Reich, ‘Research and the Struggle to Control Radio’; Bruland, ‘The Management of Intellectual Property at Home and Abroad’.

21. Guise-Richardson, ‘Redefining Vulcanization’.

22. The distinction between defensive and offensive uses of patents is often used, but these concepts have distinctive connotations and are easily confused. E.g. Reich, ‘Research and the Struggle to Control Radio’; Gilardoni, ‘Basic Approaches to Patent Strategy’.

23. Yin, Case Study Research.

24. Ranking by balance sheet total, Bloemen, Fransen, and Van Zanden, ‘De Vermogens-ontwikkeling van Nederlands Grootste Industriële Bedrijven’.

25. For an assessment of the effects: Schiff, Industrialization without National Patents. For an institutional history: Gerzon, Nederland, een volk van struikrovers?

26. Sluyterman, Kerende kansen, 65, 130; Vermij, ‘Schaalvergroting en haar idealen’, 110–11.

27. Using Esp@cenet, a public database: http://www.espacenet.com. Geographical coverage of this database is excellent, but it does not provide all application dates. Hence, the publication dates of granted patents are used here. Search strategy followed straightforwardly from a list of individuals, companies and subsidiaries in the Berkel concern.

28. This often leads to analysis in language that makes little business sense, e.g. Barrera, ‘The Evolution of Corporate Technological Capabilities’.

29. Glavimans, Een halve eeuw Berkel. Archival records are referred to by ARB, followed by the inventory number. The records are deposited at the archives of the City of Rotterdam, the Netherlands; access code 427.

30. Van Jaarsveld, ‘Wilhelmus Adrianus van Berkel’.

31. Glavimans, Een halve eeuw Berkel. This book was printed without page numbers.

32. ‘Improvements in Machines for Slicing German Sausages and the Like,’ 11 February 1899 (GB189825857).

33. Letter Parker Carter to American Slicing Machine Company, 25 November 1904 (ARB:220).

34. Gerzon, Nederland, een volk van struikrovers?, 75, 84–6.

35. Maarschalk, The Role of Patents in Technological Progress.

36. See the annual reports and minutes; ARB.

37. See: Smit, Honderd jaar Nederlandsch Octrooibureau.

38. Boele, ‘Familie Nijgh’.

39. This article uses the international trade name – Berkel – to make the text easier to read for non-Dutch speakers. Berkel refers to the company; Van Berkel refers to persons, i.e. Wilhelmus van Berkel or his son Cor.

40. Nederlandsche Staatscourant, 20 October 1898, appendix 425.

41. Annual reports 1899, 1902/03 (ARB:32, 36); Shareholders’ meeting 23 June 1900 (ARB: 161)

42. Everwijn, Beschrijving van handel en nijverheid in Nederland, vol. 1, 52–69, 100–121.

43. ‘Eerste Nederlandsche Rijwiel- en Machinefabriek’.

44. ‘Fleischschneidemaschine’, 2 January 1913 (CH57290).

45. Annual reports 1900/01, 1901/02 (ARB:34, 35).

46. Cf. Thomson, ‘Learning by Selling and Invention’.

47. Glavimans, Een halve eeuw Berkel; Annual report 1901/02 (ARB:35).

48. Annual reports 1901/02, 1902/03 (ARB:35, 36).

49. Annual report 1902/03 (ARB:36); Shareholders’ meeting 11 November 1903 (ARB: 161).

50. Annual reports 1906/07, 1907/08, 1911/12 (ARB:40, 41, 46); Shareholders’ meeting 23 September 1908 (ARB:161).

51. Register of customers, undated (ARB:782).

52. Annual report 1902/03 (ARB:36).

53. Broadbent, The Avery Business.

54. Glavimans, Een halve eeuw Berkel; Shareholders’ meeting 23 September 1908 (ARB:161).

55. Annual report 1904/05 (ARB:38).

56. ‘Machine zum schneiden von Fleischwaaren’, 7 December 1898 (DE107001).

57. Annual reports 1903/04, 1906/07, 1907/08 (ARB:37, 40, 41)

58. Letter Octrooibureau to Berkel, 20 February 1905 (ARB:220); Annual reports 1904/05, 1905/06, 1906/07 (ARB:38, 39, 40).

59. Annual report 1905/06 (ARB:39); Shareholders’ meeting, 8 November 1906.

60. Supervisory board 9 November 1900, 25 September 1901 (ARB:163)

61. Agreement, 7 December 1903 (ARB:220).

62. Glavimans, Een halve eeuw Berkel; Shareholders’ meeting, 11 November 1903 (ARB:161); Letter W.A. van Berkel to Wing, Putnam, Birlingham, 22 November 1906 (ARB:220).

63. Shareholders’ meeting, 30 October 1901 (ARB:161); Annual report 1903/04 (ARB:37); Glavimans, Een halve eeuw Berkel.

64. Shareholders’ meeting, 30 November 1901 (ARB:161)

65. Annual report 1905/06 (ARB:39).

66. Treurniet, ‘Mechanische Techniek’. Dutch patent law was enacted in 1910; two years later the patent office opened, and patents could be applied for.

67. ‘An Improved Meat Support’, 29 July 1909 (GB190913124); ‘Improvements in Clamping Devices’, 2 July 1920 (GB138907); ‘Improvements in Clamping Devices’, 7 August 1920 (GB138936).

68. Minutes supervisory board meetings 1918–30 (ARB: 163).

69. ‘Improvements Relating to Slicing Machines’, 21 February 1929 (GB306280).

70. ‘Van onze octrooi-afdeling’, undated (ARB:321); ‘Proposed Improvements’, 1927 (ARB:338)

71. Van Jaarsveld, ‘Wilhelmus Adrianus van Berkel’.

72. Promotional materials of US Slicing, ca. 1915 (ARB:852). ‘The First Twenty-One Years’, December 1930 (ARB:782).

73. Glavimans, Een halve eeuw Berkel.

74. For instance, respectively: ‘Driving Mechanism for Slicing Machines’, 11 March 1924 (US1486274); ‘Door een motor aangedreven machine voor het snijden van vlees en andere eetbare waren’, 17 April 1930 (NL21975); ‘Moteur à courant alternatif, à nombre de pôles variable’, 2 February 1927 (FR616452).

75. ‘Improvements relating to anti-dazzle screens for automobiles’, 27 February 1930 (GB325682).

76. Supervisory board 10 March 1932 (ARB:163).

77. E.g. ‘Demper voor snelwegers’, 18 January 1921 (NL5683).

78. ‘Snelweger’, 3 July 1921 (NL6214).

79. Bloemen, Fransen, and Van Zanden, ‘De Vermogensontwikkeling van Nederlands Grootste Industriële Bedrijven’.

80. Reich, ‘Lighting the Path to Profit’.

81. Sluyterman, Kerende Kansen; Vermij, ‘Schaalvergroting en haar idealen’.