Innovation and Patenting within Containerized Liner Shipping

Abstract

Increasingly, in many industries, companies commercialize their technology and innovations through patenting to gain an edge over competition. Within the maritime sector, while literature on innovation is expanding, issues related to the importance of intangible assets, such as patenting, for the participant firms of the industry remain unaddressed. Utilizing innovational frameworks and patent data withdrawn from European Patent Organization’s (EPO’s) database, the aim of this paper is to investigate the innovative level, in terms of patents granted, of incumbent market actors in liner shipping. Apart from patent counts, this exercise sheds light on the areas to which these patents apply, providing a classification while also investigating additional attributes which relate to patent citations, investors and applicants. Although results indicate a varying degree of utilization of the patenting system amongst liner carriers, they nonetheless affirm to some extent that knowledge creation is a valuable tool in the arsenal of some liner carriers, and that patenting is one of the various means utilized to enhance their market position and achieve a sustained competitive advantage. In addition, findings suggest that liner carriers’ innovative efforts have, based on the forward citations received, some significance, while they focus primarily the development of patented technologies which enhance the operational efficiency of their vessels. In this respect, the investigation undertaken sheds some light and provides a novel perspective on understanding the behaviour and innovative propensity of liner shipping companies.

1. Introduction

Increasing economic integration and interdependence amongst the world’s national economies has materialized in a remarkable growth of international trade. Trade amongst nations has always been a major proponent of wealth and prosperity enhancement for the world’s population [1]. Especially in the context of globalization and of dispersed production and consumption, modern maritime transport is the backbone of international trade, as well as a key contributing factor in the economic growth and development of countries around the globe. Within the literature, this relationship between the development of maritime transport and the dynamics of economic growth in coastal, islandic, and landlocked countries and regions alike is well established [2,3,4]. In addition, it has been proven that for the case of the liner shipping segment of seaborne transport, which acts as the medium for the import and export of manufactured and semimanufactured goods, a country’s liner connectivity plays an important role in determining the latter’s ability to access the world markets, and hence its capacity to magnify the prosperity derived from international trade [5].

Notwithstanding its positive links to the economy, nations’ ever-increasing reliance on maritime transport and a fortiori upon liner shipping, to carry out the transport of massive commodity flows over longer and more complex supply chains, renders them more vulnerable to potential disruptions. This issue has become increasingly apparent during the COVID-19 pandemic. Disruption occurrences in liner shipping operations affect schedule reliability and may increase the total cost of delivering cargoes at ports, and also may result in substantial monetary losses for liner shipping companies if not properly addressed [6]. Considering the increasing volumes of the international seaborne trade, demand for effective maritime transport is growing, with liner shipping companies having to improve efficiency and resilience of their operations to remain competitive [7,8]. Competitive struggles therefore triggers liner carriers to devise novel operational enhancements in the form of new innovations and inventions to increase the efficiency and effectiveness of their transport networks.

In this respect, McLean’s [9] Patent US2853968A, under the title “Apparatus for shipping freight”, is to remain in history not only as an innovation that had profound implications in transport conduct, signalling the era of containerization in freight transport, but also as one of the critical driving forces in the surge towards global integration. According to Schumpeter’s [10,11] view on innovation, McLean would be considered the charismatic personality, the entrepreneur who by “doing things differently in the realm of economic life”, pushed capitalist development forth. The radical innovation of the standard shipping containers which nowadays carry vast amounts of global commerce, brought along since its inception major disruptive changes which revolutionized the whole transport sector, as well as a myriad of other incremental innovations to enable the process of change [12].

More than 60 years since McLean’s innovation, the containerized transport market has little resemblance to what started off as a niche market. Exploration of innovation possibilities to further enhance operational performance, reduce costs and minimize commodities “fallow time” have led to leapfrogs in efficiency and increased speeds of commodity circulation, enabling in turn the exponential growth of the container trade [13]. After all, effective utilization of technological capabilities has been related to a firm’s capacity to develop and sustain a competitive advantage [14], as well as to an increase its market share [15]. Particularly for the containerized transport segment of liner shipping, utilization of technological capabilities through the application of superior knowledge and skills in developing new and better ways of conducting business [16], along with the rising (derived) demand for carriage, have been accompanied by the progressive rise in concentration through the proliferation of incumbent players [17].

However, despite the formulation of an oligopolistic market structure in liner shipping, established through organic growth (addition of capacity) as well as through excessive vertical and horizontal integration strategies [18,19], pursuing innovation has become incessant and of paramount importance in the competitive struggle. In the Schumpeterian view of innovation “the prospect of market power and large scale, spurs innovation” and that is why larger firms and firms in concentrated industries, with greater market power and deep pockets to finance R&D (research and development), have better incentives to innovate [20]. As the potential cost savings in maritime transport are becoming narrower, while international rivalry is also exacerbated, the pressure to utilize resources more effectively through novel innovations is growing [21]. In this respect, developing new innovations and technologies to enhance further efficiency and improve operations is a key resource in sustaining competitiveness. In [22], it is argued that firms operating within such an intense competitive fight, no matter what their field is, have rendered innovativeness as one of the most important characteristics of enterprise, not only for development but for survival itself.

Increasingly, in many industry sectors, companies commercialize their technology and innovations through patenting to gain an edge over competition. However, although patenting and intellectual property protection is not something novel, even in transport chains, a deeper investigation into the subject matter and more specifically of the patents granted to containerized transport actors has not yet been undertaken within maritime literature. In this respect, this paper sets the stage for a discussion on innovation and a quantification of patenting within the liner shipping sector. More particularly, the paper aims to investigate and record the innovative level of incumbent liner firms while also unveiling the sectors and the specific fields in which these transport actors are pursuing novel innovations, based on a first classification of their granted patents. Ultimately, through the above analysis, the paper aspires to empirically revisit the Schumpeterian hypothesis which suggests that larger firms are also the most innovative ones. To this end, the contribution of this paper is twofold. On the one hand, it is the first paper within literature to address and incorporate the overlooked issue of patenting into the discussion of innovation within the maritime sector. On the other hand, it sheds light on the patenting activity of incumbent liner shipping firms, as well as on the characteristics and attributes of their granted patents, providing thus a first mapping of the patented inventions within the liner sector as well as the extent to which each carrier under investigation utilizes the patent system.

The remainder of the paper is structured as follows. In Section 2, a review of innovation literature both outside and within the maritime studies is undertaken. This is followed by an analysis of the methodology utilized in Section 3, while Section 4 presents the results obtained by the analysis of the patenting activity of liner shipping companies, along with the fields of their application. Finally, Section 5 discusses the results obtained and attempts to draw some more general conclusions on the relationship between innovation, firm size and competitiveness.

2. Literature Review

Over the past 20 years, the maritime industry has often been regarded as inadaptable to change and less prone to innovate [23]. Many of the technologies utilized and the operational processes implemented to date are characterized as almost archaic. In the relevant academic literature, scholars have until recently exhibited little interest in how innovation is accounted for, in the transport firm’s strategic processes, or how the innovation process per se is assessed, drawing broader conclusions with regard to the factors that favour or disfavour the successful adoption of innovative ideas [24,25].

Notable early exceptions are those of Sahal [26], who by examining three transport systems presents a theory of technological development which suggests that accumulated experience and scale of operations are the two important factors which complementarily play a crucial role in the process of innovation and technological change; Sheppard [27] who illustrates how cost-reducing and time-reducing technical change in the means of transport are one of the few ways to ensure an increased rate of profit for industrial capital; and of Garrison [28] who focuses on the workings of innovation processes in transport systems, to conclude that transport improvements become the mother of necessity in enabling social and economic advances. Finally, with particular reference to the maritime sector, Jenssen and Randøy [29,30] and Jenssen [31] were the first to scrutinize the parameters which render the shipping industry innovative and can lead to the development of distinctive competitive advantages that are difficult to imitate, the ones who investigated the organizational and interorganizational factors that have a significant positive effect on the degree of innovation exhibited, as well as those who gauged the positive impact of product–process innovation on shipping firms’ performance in terms of financial results, market position and bargaining power.

Against this backdrop of limited theoretical and empirical studies on innovation within the field of maritime, a new stream of literature on the subject emerged shortly after the global economic meltdown of 2008. Arguably, economic recession and crisis conditions have been the springboard to accelerate the efforts to systematize innovation and to explore novel innovational approaches and trajectories [32]. While the liner shipping sector faces numerous challenges and opportunities, especially after the rise of new digital industrial technologies within the context of the 4th Industrial Revolution [33], a surge in literature towards the underpinning of the processes to promote sectoral innovation, its possible applications, and effects, has been observed.

Within this context, Fruth and Teuteberg [34] as well as Sanchez-Gonzales et al. [35] undertake a Systematic Literature Review (SLR) and subcategorize into specific domains the emerging literature on digitization in the maritime sector. Similarly, Lambrou et al. [36] conduct a literature review on digitization in shipping to formulate a theoretical model which systematizes the technological components, the prevalent strategic drivers and the determinant factors of shipping digitalization. Despite some typological differences, all three studies identify similar trending topics in maritime literature, some of which are: automation, big data, Internet of Things (IoT) and artificial intelligence (AI), amongst others.

The advent and operational utilization of autonomous ships (AS) or unmanned vessels (UV) is undoubtedly a big forthcoming challenge for the maritime industry, possibly capable of significantly reconfiguring the industry’s structure [37]. While several research programs are under development [38,39], researchers are increasingly focused on identifying the important criteria for establishing a viable transport system with AS [40] and the potential hazards, safety, navigational and risk aversion issues faced [41,42,43] as well as the potential benefits of AS from an economic, societal and environmental perspective [38,44,45].

Furthermore, the comprehensive studies of Yang et al. [46] and Munim et al. [47] which review the literature on big data and automatic identification systems (AIS) and big data and AI, respectively, reveal the effervescence within the maritime research community about their potential applications within the industry. Brouer et al. [48] suggest that big data withdrawn from operational processes can be utilized to establish predictive and prescriptive models, which in turn can increase the efficiency of decision making with regard to large-scale planning problems faced within the liner shipping industry, such as network design, empty container repositioning, vessel stowage plans and bunker purchasing. Dominguez [49] supports that big data on marine traffic can be used to predict ships’ arrival times in ports with greater accuracy, thus increasing dock utilization and port–vessel synchronization while reducing waiting times and operational costs. Similarly, Watson et al. [50] document a reproducible method utilizing nautical charts and AIS data from ships, to determine the potential savings on carbon emissions when vessels utilize green steam to minimize anchoring times.

Environmental sustainability, due to its ever more important role in today’s maritime industry, is yet another field of research which is being increasingly explored by academics. According to Lin et al. [51], green strategies such as speed reduction, fuel switching, and alternative fuels, can effectively reduce the harmful emissions from ships and increase environmental sustainability of liner carriers. In this respect, Wang and Wang [52], estimate the optimal vessel sailing speed to reduce fuel consumption while maintaining the service level in order to determine the number of ships deployed on a weekly liner service. In [53], a multiobjective mathematical model addressing routing and scheduling of vessels in the maritime transportation domain is proposed for the mitigation of fuel consumption and carbon emissions. Similarly, in [54], a novel hybrid algorithm is proposed to aid shipping companies to readjust their vessel’s route and bunkering decisions in an efficient and sustainable manner. Respectively, De et al. [55] explore the sustainable container shipping problem considering bunker fuel management strategies, and provide adequate recovery policies for countering disruption within maritime transportation. The authors develop a mathematical formulation which maximizes the profit incurred for a shipping company by increasing the revenue generated while lowering the fuel bunkering, loading and unloading, and carbon-tax-related costs. Conversely, total expected cost (consisting of inventory, operating and bunkering costs) minimization for a liner shipping network under different fuel pricing scenarios through a mixed integer, nonlinear programming model is proposed in [56].

Tian et al. [57] acknowledge the magnitude of scientific and technological advancements in the fields of telecommunications, computers, information, automation and smart control in the support and realization of intelligent shipping, and introduce the concept of the Internet of Vessels (IoV), which integrates all the above technologies into a platform that interconnects ship and shore facilities and allows them to exchange real-time information through the internet. According to the authors, IoV enhances the ability to navigate and communicate while offering security protection and a more efficient, intelligent and safer shipping transport environment. Bai et al. [58] in turn, propose a cyber-physical system (CPS) model with integrated RFID, sensors, etc., which collects and transmits data on the status and location of containers transported, thus enabling their remote monitoring throughout their voyage.

Finally, [59] combined innovation capability with logistics service capability to develop a dynamic model to assess the relationships amongst resources, logistics service capability, innovation capability and firm performance in the context of Taiwanese container-shipping service firms. Amongst the other hypotheses tested, the results obtained imply that a container-shipping service firm with a high degree of information equipment resources and corporate image will have better innovation capabilities, while in turn those firms with better innovation capabilities, will also have better logistics capabilities.

Research Gap and Contribution

As depicted in the above literature review, maritime innovation is an emerging research topic, attracting the interest of an ever-growing number of researchers, especially over the last decade. However, while research so far focuses on the application of novel technologies such as big data, AIS and AI [34,35,36,47] within the shipping industry, on innovative concepts such as AS and IoV [37,38,44,45], as well as on the enhancement of environmental sustainability of the sector [51,52,53,54,55,56], the aspect of patenting as a proponent of innovation has not been incorporated within the above discussion. In extension, no study has yet investigated or recorded the patenting activity or the propensity towards patenting of major actors within the maritime sector such as shipping firms, rendering the topic an uncharted field of research. In this vein, this study attempts to fill these research gaps, by addressing the aspect of patenting within the maritime sector, enriching the academic discussion on innovation with an additional perspective. Additionally, the paper undertakes an in-depth investigation of the patenting activity of the 10 largest liner carriers, providing a first record, a classification of the fields of application and an analysis of several supplementary attributes of the patents granted to these shipping companies. Finally, through the above mapping, the propensity towards patenting as well as the extent to which each firm utilizes the patent system is unveiled.

3. Materials and Methods

3.1. Research Framework

Despite the ever-expanding literature that addresses and revolves around the various facets of innovation within the maritime industry, especially over the last decade, numerous aspects and frameworks of the innovation theory, analysed in the context of the broader economic literature, remain largely unaddressed. These frameworks, which were originally developed outside the scope of maritime innovation, include amongst others (a) the resource/knowledge-based view of the firm, (b) the Schumpeterian innovation framework as well as the (c) network theory of interorganizational relationships.

The first of these theories, the resource-based view (RBV) of the firm, contends that each firm is heterogeneous and consists of a unique set of tangible and intangible resources and capabilities [60]. In an ever-evolving and highly competitive global environment however, firms must constantly acquire, expand and develop their resources and capabilities in order to achieve a sustained competitive advantage [61]. Within this line of reasoning, a growing body of literature regards knowledge as the most fundamental resource in the effort to develop a sustained competitive advantage [62].

Based on this view, in the knowledge-based view of the firm (KBV), as it is often regarded, knowledge is a unique intangible firm resource [63] which holds the potential to be at the same time valuable, rare, and difficult to imitate and substitute, hence it fulfils the four attributes required as per Barney [64] to achieve a sustained competitive advantage. According to McGuirk and Hart [65] the existence within the firm of human capital with higher levels of education, training and skills, increases the propensity of the firm to produce technical and organizational innovation. For Moulier-Boutang [66] this shift towards knowledge describes the current system of accumulation which he terms “cognitive capitalism”, where the resources originally outside of the economic sphere are integrated into the economic sphere, rendering knowledge the principal resource in the process of creating innovative value [67].

In turn, Schumpeter’s innovation framework, as developed in his phenomenal work “Capitalism, Socialism, and Democracy” [68], in which he also coined the term of creative destruction which “incessantly revolutionizes the economic structure from within, incessantly destroying the old one, incessantly creating a new one”, suggested that a market structure involving large firms with a considerable degree of market power is the price that society must pay for rapid technological progress [69]. In other words, firms in concentrated markets and with greater market power are, amongst others, more competent to finance R&D activities and appropriate the returns and hence have better incentives to innovate [70]. While innovations are also triggered by garage tinkerers and public funding [71], Styliadis and Chlomoudis [13] suggest that firms in concentrated markets have a greater capacity to diffuse the surplus value appropriated and to develop novel innovations which further decrease the turnover time of their capital circuit by either increasing its velocity or its scale and intensity.

In the antipode, the network theory of interorganizational relationships suggests that when the base of an industry is both complex and expanding and the sources of expertise are widely dispersed, the locus of innovation will be found in networks of learning, rather than in individual firms [72]. While interfirm networks such as partnerships, strategic alliances, coalitions and collaborative agreements can enhance market access [73], access to finance [74] and diversified resources [75], as well as increase the market power of the partnering firms [76], it is also increasingly supported within literature that interorganizational relationships are an important factor in increasing access to knowledge, thus creating the conditions which enhance firms’ innovative performance [77]. In parallel, increased market access, through the build-up of interorganizational relationships, has been recognized as an additional factor which can accelerate innovation [78], as firms are more likely to invest additional resources to investigate potentially useful discoveries in response to an increase in the expected returns [79].

The above brief analysis of these three innovation frameworks has been undertaken in order to utilize their insights in the formulation of our hypothesis, which will be tested in the remainder of this paper. More specifically, as the liner shipping industry exhibits an increased degree of concentration achieved through organic growth and consecutive merger and acquisition waves as well as high levels of interorganizational relationships through the establishment of strategic alliances, our aim is to investigate whether the incumbent firms in the liner shipping market display increased levels of innovative activity.

To this end, we ultimately aim to understand whether knowledge is considered a primal resource for major liner carriers in their effort to further increase their market power and achieve a sustained competitive advantage. More specifically, since knowledge is an intangible company asset, our intention is to gauge the outcomes of knowledge in the form of innovative activity. One possible way to measure this is through the investigation of the patents granted to the 10 largest (in terms of capacity) liner shipping companies.

3.2. Data Sources & Methodology

In essence, a patent, along with other types of intangible assets such as copyrights, trademarks and trade secrets, is a form of intellectual property (IP), granting the holder legal protection for an invention in all fields of technology, which might be a novel product or a process that provides a new way of doing something or offers a new technical solution to a problem [80]. In addition, patents provide their owners an exclusive right to an invention, preventing third parties from commercially exploiting their invention for a maximum period of 20 years from the filling date [81]. Unless permitted by the proprietor of the patent, one commits patent infringement by making, using, offering to sell, or selling something that contains every element of a patented claim or its equivalent, while the patent is in effect [82].

According to the World’s Intellectual Property Office (WIPO), the principle behind the modern patent is that an inventor is allowed a limited amount of time to exclude others from supplying or using an invention in order to encourage inventive activity by preventing immediate imitation. In return, the inventor is obliged to make the description and implementation of the novel invention public rather than keeping it secret, allowing others to build more easily on the knowledge contained in his invention [83]. In this sense, while on the one hand patents grant protection to their holders, on the other hand they disclose important information about state-of-the-art inventions, thus aiding the process for future innovations. As recorded in WIPO’s annual report [84] characteristic of the increasing importance of patents is the long-term trend which shows patent applications growing worldwide every year since 1995, apart from 2002, 2009 and 2019, when they decreased by 0.9%, 3.8% and 3%, respectively.

The observed growth in patenting has also stimulated the interest of researchers from various academic fields, who are increasingly interested in assessing the effectiveness of the patent system in promoting innovative activity among private firms [85] as well as the implications patents have in market structure and competition [86]. Thus, while patents’ importance varies greatly across industries, they are the typical output of application-oriented types of R&D, and despite their weaknesses, they provide a good measure of innovativeness as they reflect the technological capabilities of firms [87]. In addition, apart from having a direct effect on the performance of firms, patents, especially when an increased number of them is granted in a particular market, can indirectly act as an entry barrier, deterring new firms from entering the market [81] as well as a mechanism to block competition [88]. In this vein, in order to fulfil our research aim, we will undertake a systematic review of granted patents based on [89] who propose a three-stage procedure, comprising planning, execution and reporting phases.

In the primal planning stage, we set the objectives of this exercise. As our objective is to capture the innovative activity within the liner shipping sector in the form of patents granted, we intend to undertake a deep investigation on the EPO’s (European Patent Office) comprehensive database, in order to make a first record and a classification of the patents granted to the 10 largest liner shipping companies [90]. Such a venture, to the best of our knowledge has never been undertaken before within the maritime literature.

As a comprehensive search distinguishes a systematic review from a traditional narrative review [89], in the following stage of execution we defined the initial selection criteria and the keywords to be searched in EPO’s database [91]. Following Bessen and Hunt [92], we used a search algorithm based on keywords, company names, and subsidiaries and abbreviations rather than the EPO’s classification system, to identify the patent documents of the liner shipping companies. As such, an in-depth study, utilizing multiple alternative keywords was undertaken, based on the name of the company included in the top 10 liner shipping companies, e.g., Maersk, Mediterranean Shipping Company (MSC), COSCO Shipping, CMA-CGM, Hapag-Lloyd, ONE, Evergreen, Hyundai Merchant Marine (HMM), Yang Ming, ZIM; the name of affiliated companies, subsidiaries, and start-ups of the above-mentioned companies (e.g., Safmarine, APL, NOL, Nippon Yusen Kaisha (NYK), Mitsui O.S.K. Lines (MOL), and K Line, etc.).

The results of the more than 140 queries performed in EPO’s patent database allowed us to compile an initial sample of more than 570 relevant patents, dating from the 1970’s to 2021. The surprisingly high number of patents granted to liner shipping companies and the wide range of their applicability (from ship design and logistics to AI technologies, amongst others) reveals that the utilization of patents in an effort to protect their intellectual property rights and/or block competition has been a standard practice within the liner shipping sector for a sufficient period of time.

Furthermore, the patents of the initial sample were screened according to their relevance and their publication date. As far as the first additional parameter is concerned, whenever it was unclear whether the patent was related to the container segment of liner shipping, we downloaded the full patent application containing information such as mosaics and details of the invention to be patented, to study the application area further. Respectively, regarding the timeframe of our research, due to the increase in the number of applications observed from 2008 onwards, we excluded from our sample all patents granted prior to 2008 as well as those granted in 2021, thus narrowing down the period under research to from 2008 to 2020. After the above sorting, the final sample included 550 relevant patents, granted within the 2008 and 2020 interval.

Having finalized our sample, we proceeded by classifying the selected patents according to: (a) applicant’s name/number of applicants, (b) inventor’s name/number of inventors, (c) publication date, (d) patent’s field of application, (e) patent’s backward citations, (f) patent’s forward citations, and finally (g) whether the patent is directly or indirectly related to the companies included in our sample.The steps followed are depicted in Figure 1. below.

Finally, after the collection and organization of the data on patents granted, we proceeded to the third stage of reporting, where data were processed and analysed. The results of this meta-analysis are reported in the section below.

4. Results

4.1. Temporal Distribution of Patents

This study, as outlined in the methodology section above, reviewed the patents granted to the 10 largest liner shipping companies operating in the containerized segments of liner shipping over the 2008–2020 period. In this context, 550 granted patents were found in EPO’s database over the last 13 years, the yearly distribution of which is presented in the following Figure 2.

The number of patents granted each year, despite the fluctuations observed, follows an upward trend over the last five years. More particularly, the patent output over the 2008–2011 interval numbered 101 publications, with the average number of patents granted on an annual base being 25.25. From 2012 to 2015, patent output increased to 171, with the per year average publications increasing to 42.75, while more than half (50.5%) of the patents included in the sample (550) were published over the last 5 years.

More particularly, although the number of granted patents decreased for two consecutive years after the spike observed in 2014, the downward trend was reversed during the 2017–2020 interval, over which the average output ascended to 62 patents per year. The progressive growth in patents published over the years reveals that liner shipping companies increasingly resort to the patent system to commercialize their technologies and safeguard their innovative efforts from competition.

Moving forth from the overall picture to the distinct patent activity of liner shipping companies, we distinguish two groups; one comprising innovative carriers with a high number of patents in their portfolios, and a second group of carriers with little or no innovative activity at all. This first distinction denotes that while patents granted follow an upward trend over recent years, this growth is attributed only to a portion of liner carriers who increasingly take advantage of the patenting system.

Table 1. Patents Granted to Liner Shipping Companies (Source: [91]; Authors’ elaboration).

		Liner Shipping Companies’ Patents/per Year
		AP MOELLER MAERSK	COSCO SHIPPING	HMM	ONE	CMA-CGM
Year	2008	7	1	4	2	0
	2009	14	9	4	8	1
	2010	11	1	2	11	0
	2011	12	4	2	8	0
	2012	9	1	0	11	0
	2013	20	3	2	9	0
	2014	5	13	45	12	0
	2015	5	10	18	8	0
	2016	10	3	1	16	0
	2017	13	12	2	16	0
	2018	10	14	6	20	0
	2019	10	27	9	27	1
	2020	22	14	13	32	0
	Sum	148	112	108	180	2

portrays the patents granted on a yearly basis to each liner carrier. On an individual firm level, ONE, which comprises ‘K’ Line, Mitsui O.S.K. Lines and NYK Line, stands out as the most innovative liner shipping company, with numerous yearly publications (except 2008) and a total of 180 patents (32.7% of the sample) throughout the 2008–2020 interval. Similarly, Maersk, COSCO and HMM are also highly innovative with 148 (26.9%), 112 (20.4%) and 108 (19.6%) patents, respectively. While variations in the yearly patent output are observed, the results indicate that each of these companies rely heavily on and utilize increasingly, especially over the last years, the patent system to protect their intellectual property rights. On a yearly basis, 2020 was the most productive year on a collective level, with 81 patents granted, while on a firm level the highest output was recorded by HMM in 2014, when the company published 45 patents within just one year.

Conversely, CMA-CGM’s patent output over the 12-year period is rather poor, with just two (0.4%) patents, while MSC, Hapag-Lloyd, Evergreen, Yang Ming and Zim do not hold any patents in effect. In fact, of these liners, CMA-CGM [94], Hapag-Lloyd [95], MSC [96] and ZIM [97] have faced claims of patent infringement. Overall, the patent system may not be the sole path towards the promotion of innovation for liner carriers, as many of the above (along with those utilizing the patent system) have joined collaborative innovative efforts such as Maersk’s and IBM’s Tradelens blockchain platform (Maersk, MSC, CMA-CGM, Hapag-Lloyd, ONE, ZIM, etc.) [98], the Hydrogen Council (MSC, CMA-CGM, NYK) [99] and the Digital Container Shipping Association (MSC, Maersk, CMA-CGM, Evergreen Line, Hyundai Merchant Marine, Yang Ming, ZIM, Hapag-Lloyd, ONE) [100], however this indicates to some extent the degree to which each liner values knowledge creation on an individual firm level.

4.2. Patent Classification

In addition to the yearly distribution, patents of our sample were further surveyed based on their description and information included in EPO’s database, to distinguish the main fields of their applicability. In this vein, we established a set of ad hoc categories to group patents granted to the liner shipping companies.

More specifically, six major categories were distinguished; namely: (1) ship design, which includes patents related to the design of containerships; (2) ship’s accessories, referring to patents related to ship’s devices and units such as valves, cylinders, clamps, etc., or equipment aimed at enhancing for example anchoring, wind resistance, etc.; (3) ship’s operational systems and devices, for patents aimed at enhancing the ship’s operational performance such as navigation support devices, voyage plan design assistance, ballast water-treatment arrangement, stowage system, etc.; (4) information exchange—monitoring and control systems and devices, for patents related to data processing and measurement systems, information management and transmission systems as well as devices for monitoring and controlling the various ship segments (engine room, propeller, etc.); (5) container design, referring to patents related to the design of container boxes (including reefer ones) and (6) container’s accessories—monitoring systems and devices, for patents that comprise devices such as holds, connectors, batteries, etc., and systems for monitoring the air flow, the temperature, the freshness and condition of products carried, etc.

Based on the above categorization,

Table 2. Liner Shipping Companies’ Patent Classification (Source: [91]; Authors’ elaboration).

		Liner Shipping Company
	Column1	AP MOELLER MAERSK	COSCO SHIPPING	HMM	ONE	CMA-CGM
Patent Classification	Ship Design	18	7	13	11	0
	Ship’s Accessories	23	31	27	18	1
	Ship’s Operational Systems and Devices	34	23	48	63	0
	Information Exchange—Monitoring and Control Systems and Devices	4	19	16	24	0
	Container Design	33	12	2	26	1
	Container Accessories–Monitoring Systems and Devices	36	20	2	38	0

presents the results of the patent classification undertaken. Obtained results indicate that the majority of patents granted relate to ship operational systems and devices (30.5%). with all companies but CMA-CGM holding a sufficient number of patents in this specific field. In relation to the other areas of application this field represents 35%, 44.4%, 23% and 20.5% of all patents granted to ONE, HMM, MAERSK and COSCO, respectively.

Inventions in the ship’s accessories category is the second most prominent field in which patents are granted to the liner shipping companies, representing 18% of the aggregate total. COSCO and HMM, in particular, have the most patents in this category at 31 and 27 patents, respectively, while MAERSK and ONE follow closely with 23 and 18 patents. In addition, one of the just two patents of CMA-CGM falls within this category, while the other is on the container design category which aggregates a total of 74 patents. MAERSK stands out in this field, holding 45% of the relevant patents, with ONE holding another 35%.

These two companies also lead the container accessories, monitoring systems and devices category. Interestingly, more patents were granted in relation to unique characteristics and features that container embody (in total 96 patents) than in relation to their design. ONE, MAERSK and COSCO have more patents in this category than in the design category, while HMM, according to the results, is not particularly active in either.

In contrast, HMM holds 16 patents related to information exchange—monitoring and control systems and devices, closely behind COSCO and ONE which have 19 and 24, respectively. In total, this category represents 11.5% of the patents granted to liner shipping companies, with MAERSK being the least innovative in this field. Finally, in the ship design category, which is the field with the lowest number of granted patents counting 49 (8.9%) in total, from 2008 to 2020, MAERSK held 18 patents related to the design of containerships, with HMM, ONE and COSCO having 13, 11 and 7 patents, respectively.

4.3. Patent Citations and other Patent Statistics

On a third level of analysis, we investigate the backward and forward citations of the patents granted to liner carriers as well as some additional features of those patents related to the number of inventors and applicants as well as to whether they are directly or indirectly related to the companies included in our sample.

More particularly, we investigate the backward citations which depict the level of applicants’ knowledge in relevant research available at the time of publication, as well as the forward citations, which as in academic literature, provide a good measure of the significance of the patent. As such, apart from the average number of citations (citescore), the percent of nonzero patents, the cumulative citations and the most prominent patent per company in terms of citations received, we additionally estimate for the case of forward citations the h- index of each liner carrier, in order to obtain a snapshot of their patent performance.

In addition, we look into the average number of inventors and applicants of the granted patents in an effort to understand whether the development of inventions is a collective or solitary process, while also gauging whether the process of applying for a patent is a field which favours collaborative behaviour amongst distinct companies. Finally, since the vast majority of liner companies researched have numerous wholly owned subsidiaries as well as stakes in other related companies, we investigated whether patents granted are directly related to a wholly owned subsidiaries or indirectly to a minority stake subsidiary of the group.

In this vein,

Table 3. Liner Shipping Companies’ Patent Citation Data (Source: [91]; Authors’ elaboration).

		Liner Shipping Companies
		AP MOELLER MAERSK	COSCO SHIPPING	HMM	ONE	CMA-CGM
Backward Citation Statistics	Cite Score (Average)	3.41	4.5	1.82	3.09	5.5
	Nonzero%	43.24%	23.21%	40.7%	50.55%	50%
	Max.	43	10	50	22	11
	Cumulative Backward Citations	505	140	197	553	11
Forward Citation Statistics	Cite Score (Average)	0.96	1	0.67	0.99	2.5
	Nonzero%	29.05%	38.4%	36.11%	30.55%	100%
	Max.	29	9	6	19	4
	Cumulative Forward Citations	142	112	72	179	5
	h-index	6	5	3	6	1

and

Table 4. Liner Shipping Companies’ Patent Features (Source: [91]; Authors’ elaboration).

	Line Shipping Companies
	AP MOELLER MAERSK	COSCO SHIPPING	HMM	ONE	CMA-CGM
Average Number of Inventors	1.7	5.6	2.3	3.6	1.5
Max.	6	20	9	17	2
Average Number of Applicants	1.2	1.3	1.1	1.8	1.5
Max.	5	4	3	12	2
Direct Patents %	100%	100%	100%	100%	100%

below depict the results attained for the case of liner shipping companies under study. More particularly, in Table 3, patent citation data are divided into two sections, those of backward and forward citations, which in turn comprise four and five additional subsections, respectively. As anticipated, the results indicate that both in terms of average citations as well as in terms of cumulative citations, backward citations are considerably higher than forward ones.

Although the comparison between the two is just numerical, as for a patent to attain forward citations is much more difficult and relates to its importance and its value, the high percentage of nonzero backward patent citations (with the exception of COSCO) indicates that to a sufficient degree, patent applications contain at least one reference to relevant, prior, state-of-the-art thinking and knowledge. As depicted in the results, patents granted have on average multiple references to previous inventions, the maximum of which for each company ranges between 10 and 50 backward citations.

As far as forward citations are concerned, results indicate that more than one-third of the patents granted have received at least one citation. Interestingly, while the percent of forward-cited nonzero patents is lower than that of nonzero backward ones for the cases of MAERSK, HMM and ONE, COSCO’s and CMA-CGM’s nonzero forward citations are considerably higher. While for CMA-CGM the results are not indicative, as the company holds just two patents, in the case of COSCO it denotes that a substantial percent (38.4%) of its inventions have some significance and some value. ONE has the highest number of cumulative forward citations amongst the liner carriers under study, and along with Maersk (142) they both have the highest h-index (6). In turn, COSCO’s patents received in total less citations (112) than the above carriers, however at least five of these have been cited five or more times. The Chinese company receives on average one citation per patent, when for the rest (excluding CMA-CGM), the average ranges between 0.67 (HMM) and 0.99 (ONE). Yet, the most cited patent belongs to MAERSK and counts 29 citations, in comparison to the 19, 9 and 6 forward citations received by the most prominent patents of ONE, COSCO and HMM, respectively. HMM in turn, despite its sufficient patent output, has received in total 72 forward citations, with at least three of its patents being cited more than three times.

Similarly, in Table 4, results indicate that the process of developing a novel invention is mostly a collaborative one, as on average more than one inventor is involved. Characteristic of this fact is that for the creation of just a sole invention, as many as 20 (COSCO) or 17 (ONE) inventors may participate. Conversely, findings suggest that patent applications are on average applied solely by liner shipping companies themselves or through one of their subsidiaries, however, patents involving more than one applicant exist. More specifically, apart from the occasions where more than one companies of the liner shipping group jointly apply for a patent, additional applicants include inventors themselves as well as specialized high-tech companies. As such, while some patents may be shared with other applicants, overall, all the patents granted involve either the liner shipping companies themselves or a wholly owned subsidiary of their portfolios, and hence are directly related to them.

5. Discussion and Conclusions

The paper, through an initial review of relevant literature within the maritime industry, affirms the ever-expanding interest of academia in the various aspects of innovation. While existing papers revolve around a diverse set of mostly broad innovation issues related to the process of applying innovative ideas, the utilization of novel technologies, the development and implementation of innovation strategies as well as its effects on enhancing productivity and efficiency of operations amongst others, issues related to the importance of intangible assets such as innovation to the participant firms of the industry remain unaddressed.

In this vein, utilizing the insights of innovation frameworks proposed, which suggest that companies in concentrated markets with increased market access and interorganizational relationships, value knowledge creation and are more prone to the development of novel inventions in an effort to achieve a sustained competitive advantage; this paper sheds some light on the propensity towards innovation of the major firms within the segment of liner shipping, which features the above characteristics. To do so, as data on R&D budgets were not available, we performed an in-depth investigation of the EPO’s database and recorded their patenting activity over the 2008–2020 interval.

Results indicated a varying degree of patenting activity. Amongst the liner shipping companies investigated, only half have at least one patent, while just four (COSCO, MAERSK, HMM and ONE) have a sufficient patent portfolio, denoting an active and durable engagement in the development of novel inventions. Surprisingly, companies such as CMA-CGM, MSC and Hapag-Lloyd, which are classified amongst the five largest carriers, have little or no patenting activity at all.

Apart from the temporal distribution and the counts of patents provided, the paper suggests a first classification of the fields these patents are applied to. More particularly, as results demonstrate, the category which contains the majority of patents is that of ship operational systems and devices. Liner carriers seem to be more concerned with the operational efficiency of their vessels in an effort to further minimize the key service route cost components. Such results indicate that granted patents might on the one hand aid in enhancing productivity and efficiency of operations, while on the other shield the property rights of carriers, thus providing them an edge over competition.

Moreover, the third stage of analysis demonstrated that a significant percentage of patents granted on the one hand cite prior, state-of-the-art knowledge in relevant fields of technology, while on the other hand they are also cited in subsequent patented inventions. The forward citations attained by the liner patent procreators indicate that many of the patented inventions also have technological significance. Finally, as depicted, the process of developing novel inventions is in most cases a cooperative process involving numerous human capital units. While collaborative applications exist, the overwhelming majority of patents are granted solely to the liner companies that filled them.

Overall, the results indicated a varying degree of inventiveness amongst the liner shipping companies. While a number of companies seem to increasingly resort to the patent system to protect their innovative technologies from competition and/or enhance their market position, others utilize it moderately or not at all. To this end, the outlined hypothesis, which suggests that firms in concentrated markets with an increased number of collaborations value the significance of intangible assets more, such as knowledge creation and innovation, and invest additional resources to investigate potentially useful discoveries through the patenting system, is partly affirmed. However, although the findings only partially support the research hypothesis, they do contribute to our understanding of the behaviour and propensity towards innovation of liner shipping companies.

Indeed, depicted market leaders such as Maersk and COSCO, as well as liner carriers with significant market shares (HMM, ONE), seem to acknowledge knowledge as an important intangible company asset and display a highly innovative activity in the context of the patent system. More particularly, it can be argued that through the diffusion of funds and resources for the development of novel inventions, on the one hand market leaders (Maersk, COSCO) opt to sustain their market positions, while companies in lower ranks but nonetheless with a strong presence in the global liner market and sufficient resources (HMM, ONE) opt to enhance their competitiveness and hence their market positions. However, as results indicate, this stance is not embraced by the rest of market leaders and incumbent actors in the liner market who display little or no patent activity at all.

While the patent system may not reflect all the innovative efforts of companies, the number of patents found both on an individual firm level as well as on an aggregate level suggest that patents are one of the various means utilized by companies in liner shipping to enhance operational performance and achieve a sustained competitive advantage. Conversely, to the companies with a sufficient number of patents, those with an increased market share but with little or no use of the patent system must either utilize other innovative paths or must have deep pockets to acquire innovative technologies from third parties, in order to stay competitive. In either case however, the direct or indirect investment of additional resources to develop or acquire advanced technological capabilities constitutes an additional barrier for new entrants in the concentrated and oligopolistic market of liner shipping. A limitation of this work stems from the fact that patent research in EPO’s database was carried out manually, through keywords, company and subsidiary names, etc., of liner shipping companies, rather than relying on EPO’s classification system, which means some patents might have been omitted. Additionally, questions relating to whether patents contribute to the performance of the holder or which of these granted patents are finally adopted by liner carriers were out of the scope of this study.

Despite its limitations, the paper has dealt with the issue of innovation in the liner shipping segment of maritime transport from a totally new perspective, incorporating the aspect of patenting within the above discussion for the first time in the maritime literature. In parallel, the obtained results provide an initial mapping in this uncharted field of research. More specifically, in contrast to previous studies which discuss, propose and/or test the potential application of innovative emerging concepts within the maritime sector, the results of this study enrich the existing body of literature by providing actual insights on the major fields of innovational effort and interest of liner carriers, on the extent to which they utilize the patent system (both on an individual as well as on a collective sectoral level) as well as on additional attributes of the patent they hold, such as their significance. To this end, as this paper consists of a preliminary investigation on the subject matter of patenting within the maritime sector, and the authors aspire that this exercise and the issues raised in it will provide multiple stimuli for future research, ultimately leading to the establishment of a new subgenre within the maritime innovation research domain. In this respect, subsequent studies could elaborate further on:

• The relationship between innovational activities (patents) and performance of liner shipping companies;
• The extent to which these patented inventions are finally adopted by market actors as well as on whether these inventions can drive the sustainability impetus within the maritime industry;
• The reasons which lead to this varying degree of patenting activity amongst liner shipping companies;
• Other potential innovative paths and strategies pursued by liner carriers;
• The innovative activity in terms of patents granted to market actors in other containerized segments such as terminal operators, logistics providers and/or transport research institutions amongst others.