노인을 위한 주택개조 관련기술 특허동향 분석

This study aims to examine and analyze the current status of patent trend for housing modification related technologies for the elderly in order to understand the current situation of housing modification industry in Korea and other countries. Using KOMPASS patent search system as a searching tool, patents for housing modification related technologies in Korea, Japan, the U.S., and Europe were searched and 999 valid patents were found. The country with the most patents was Japan, which was followed by the U.S.. Valid patents were categorized based on 9 elements of criteria for technology classification (secondary lifting device, porch, kitchen, bathroom or toilet, moving assistive device, lighting or door, IT-related technology, reform plan and extra), and these were divided by country, year, and technology classification and analyzed. Through the yearly analysis of housing modification related technologies, it was found that the increase and decrease of the patent trend of each country was related to the duration of aging society and super-aged society, which is the index of the number of the elderly compared to the total population. In case of Korea, from the late 80s to the late 90s, there were intermittent applications for patents and since 2000, the year that Korea reached aging society, the number has continuously increased and patent applications for bathroom-related technology took the biggest portion. Another thing to note was that compared to other countries researched, Korea showed an increasing trend in the number of patent applications related to IT technologies such as emergency call system and abnormality detection monitoring. Still, the number of Korea’s patent applications was smaller than that of other countries analyzed, and the area of technologies that were applied for patent was not diverse. In the future, Korea will have to focus on developing housing modification technologies related to the elderly, which is at a poor stage, and for this, it will have to put efforts for developing R&D technology and securing intellectual property. Especially, compared to other countries, Korea will be able to use its domestic industrial environment that can easily apply IT technologies.