# A Study on Technology Competition of Graphene Biomedical Technology Based on Patent Analysis
## 1 Introduction  
The advent of the knowledge economy era has created substantial interest in the research of technology competition (TC). The successful of TC is regarded as the reaction capability to technological change [1]. Some studies have focused on firms' strategic planning in TC when technological change occurs [2; 3]. Others have identified that organizational and technological diversity play an important role in increasing of TC, and this in turn stimulates technological innovation in the target technological field [4; 5]. In the last decade, many researchers have studied the key indicators in assessing TC. [PERSON] presented a six-item assessment of TC, including three variables under the perspective of company's history (old core capabilities, old technology revitalization, competitive position in theold market) and the other three link to its emerging context (dynamic capabilities, easiness of new market entry, extent of new technology disruption) [1]. [PERSON] indicated that TC is regarded as an evolutionary process, and there are five essential factors which influence TC, namely technology learning, technological performance, supply and demand increasing returns to scale, commitment, and the rate of technology change [6]. In recent years, patent information has been widely applied at both technology assessment and forecasting, promoting the technological innovation process as well as technology policy [7; 8]. Patent information contains a valuable resource of technical items that are useful for researchers, practitioners, and policymakers in order to analyze TC in the target technological field [9]. As a key outlet for scientific and technological development, 80% of technical items can be found in patent information [10]. The main applications of patent information include identifying the main competitors, tracking the development trend of technology, assessing the capabilities of the technological innovation or helping organizations to formulate patent strategy and planning [11; 12; 13]. [PERSON] et al. indicated that patent information is a valuable source for displaying the development trend of a given technology and assessing the status quo of potential competitors, and the analysis of patent information is crucial to identify TC in a given technology field [14]. Unfortunately, although patent information is significant in identifying TC, few studies about the most recent patent documents of graphene biomedical technology were found within the reviewed literature in our study. A more recent study, developed by [PERSON] et al. [15], was given a general review of the whole graphene patenting activities, and focused on the investigation of sustainable competitive advantage (SCA) in this technical area. Considering the rapidly growth of the number of patents in graphene biomedical technology and the increasing attention on industrial applications in this field [16], it is crucial to understand the following two questions:  
1. What are the existing leading country/region, top assignees, and technological hotspots and fronts in patenting activity of graphene biomedical technology? 2. What are the development trends and potential opportunities from country level and assignee level patent roadmaps in this field? Therefore, the aim of this study is to develop a new and comprehensive approach to deeply analyze TC in graphene biomedical technology. The main difference between the approach in this study and previous ones is that we integrate patent analysis and a patent roadmap in order to identify TC under a dynamic perspective. Because patent analysis and patent roadmaps are effective tools for patent visualization, they assist stakeholders to understand useful technical, legal or economic information from a large number of patent documents.