XNUMX. XNUMX.Introduction

　ChatGPT announced by OpenAI in November 2022^{※ 1}has become a hot topic due to its high performance.This column examines ChatGPT and other similar services from the perspective of their applicability to patent search operations.

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^{※ 1}　https://openai.com/blog/chatgpt/

XNUMX. What is ChatGPT?

　ChatGPT is an AI chatbot (dialogue engine) developed by OpenAI, a startup company in Silicon Valley in the United States. OpenAI uses the language model GPT (Generative Pretrained Transformer)^{※ 2} Known as the company that developed the^{※ 3}, ChatGPT was developed based on its successor, GPT-3.5. Since the prototype version of ChatGPT was released in November 2022, its high performance has become a hot topic, and the number of users exceeded 11 million in two months after its release, and the speed of service expansion is also attracting attention. It is

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^{※ 2}　Radford, Alec, et al. “Improving language understanding by generative pre-training.” (2018).
^{※ 3}　It is also famous for being involved in the establishment of prominent entrepreneurs such as Elon Musk and Peter Thiel.

XNUMX. Examples of using ChatGPT

　ChatGPT can be used free of charge by accessing the website with a browser and registering as a user.^{※ 4}.Figure XNUMX shows an image of the ChatGPT website.It has a very simple structure with a text box for entering questions at the bottom of the page.

　An example of using ChatGPT is shown below.It can be seen that compared to conventional chatbots, it can answer complex questions that do not have a correct answer.It also supports Japanese.

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^{※ 4}　CEO Sam Altman has publicly stated that he is considering making ChatGPT a paid service (https://twitter.com/sama/status/1599669571795185665), which may be charged in the future.ChatGPT Plus, a paid plan, was released on February 2.

XNUMX. Problems with ChatGPT

　Although ChatGPT has such high performance, some problems have been pointed out.

XNUMX Information is out of date

　ChatGPT's learning data is based on information up to 2021, so it doesn't seem to be able to handle topics after that.In addition, it is said that this point has been resolved in Microsoft's Bing, which will be described later.

XNUMX Accuracy of information

　Answers cannot be taken at face value, as the original training data may be incorrect, or the AI ​​may derive incorrect answers.Similar to deep learning machine translation such as Google Translate and DeepL, it is difficult to notice mistakes because the answers are natural.It has also been pointed out that access to correct information may become difficult due to the massive spread of content based on such erroneous information on the Internet.Bing and Perplexity Ask, which will be described later, guarantee accuracy by specifying the information source.

XNUMX Capacity

　As mentioned above, ChatGPT is currently free to use, and due to the rapid increase in the number of users, access may be restricted.However, it is believed that this point will be improved by making the service fee-based and investing in the future.^{※ 5}.

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^{※ 5}　https://blogs.microsoft.com/blog/2023/02/07/reinventing-search-with-a-new-ai-powered-microsoft-bing-and-edge-your-copilot-for-the-web/

XNUMX.Related/similar services

XNUMX Microsoft Bing and Edge

　Microsoft has invested in OpenAI and has introduced ChatGPT technology into its search engine Bing and browser Edge. Microsoft has independently improved ChatGPT to improve the above-mentioned problems of ChatGPT, such as updating learning data and displaying the underlying information source.

XNUMX Google “BARD”

　On February 2th, Google also announced “BARD”, a dialogue AI.^{※ 6}. BARD was developed based on the company's language model LaMDA, and is said to be learning the most recent data up to January 2023.At the time of writing this blog, it is only open to test users, but it is expected to be open to the public soon.

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^{※ 6}　https://blog.google/technology/ai/bard-google-ai-search-updates/

XNUMX “Perplexity Ask” by Perplexity AI

　As a service similar to ChatGPT, "Perplexity Ask" by Perplexity AI will be released in December 2022.^{※ 7}.Compared to ChatGPT, the service is more focused on information retrieval and is more reliable in displaying the information sources that underpin answers.

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^{※ 7}　https://www.perplexity.ai/

XNUMX SciSpace

　SciSpace (formerly Typeset) is an AI service for writing and reading academic papers. It has an AI chatbot function called Copilot that allows you to upload a PDF of the paper^{※ 8}can be answered interactively.

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^{※ 8}　It seems that patent documents can also be read.

XNUMX.Examples of application to patent search work

　We examined and considered the application of ChatGPT to patent search work.

XNUMX Business/technology understanding task

　In patent research, it is essential to first understand the business and technology.At present, when researching fields in which there is no knowledge, many searchers seem to first collect information by searching the Internet, but using ChatGPT may improve the efficiency of information collection.Services that display information sources, such as Perplexity Ask and Bing, are particularly useful in terms of information reliability.

XNUMX Search task

　A search for "automated driving" on ChatGPT returns a somewhat likely answer (Fig. XNUMX).Doesn't seem to be suitable for tasks like searching patents directly^{※ 9}.On the other hand, there seems to be some degree of accuracy in synonyms and responses to IPC (Figs. XNUMX and XNUMX).However, because false or inaccurate information may be mixed up,^{※ 10} , should be used as a reference.

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^{※ 9}　However, because it has studied a wide range of web information, depending on the technical field, it may be effective in researching non-patent literature.
^{※ 10}　In particular, the IPC and its definition are incongruous.

XNUMX Peer review and classification tasks

　ChatGPT, Bing (Edge), and SciSpace can also summarize documents.In addition, since it is possible to ask questions from a specific perspective such as "problem", it may be possible to improve the efficiency of peer review and classification.However, it should be noted that there is also the possibility of incorrect information being included here.

XNUMX Analysis Task

　It seems that it is possible to ask companies to compare the number of patents, but it outputs data for 2022, which should not have data, and doubts remain about its reliability.In addition, due to the characteristics of the learning data, it may not be good at comparing companies other than Europe and the United States.^{※ 11}.

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*11 We were unable to obtain a response regarding the comparison of Toyota, Nissan, and Honda.

XNUMX.Issues in using patent search services

XNUMX Accuracy of Information

　Neither service guarantees the accuracy of the answers, so the information is for reference only. Bing and Perplexity Ask try to guarantee reliability by specifying the information source, but in any case it is necessary to verify the information.

XNUMX Security

　As with other web services, information must be uploaded to an external server, so care must be taken when handling information.

XNUMX Opportunities for insight and awareness

　Although automatic summarization is very convenient in terms of improving work efficiency, it loses the opportunity to gain insight and awareness that can be obtained by directly reading patent documents.Also, since chatbots basically only answer what is asked, it is difficult to obtain information that exceeds initial expectations.

XNUMX.Assumed future development

　As mentioned above, we examined the application of ChatGPT and other similar services to patent research work.Although these AI chatbots have issues, they are still powerful tools depending on how they are used, and it is quite possible that they will be incorporated into patent search operations in the future.
　Just as Microsoft incorporated ChatGPT into Bing and Edge, Google is expected to add BARD to Google Search and Chrome.Searches and searchs using AI chatbots will become the norm.In particular, Google also has document search services such as Google Patents and Google Scholar, so it is not hard to imagine the spread of AI chatbots in patent research work in this respect as well.In addition, with regard to commercial patent databases, each company has been promoting the implementation of AI in recent years, and it is thought that the installation of AI chatbots will also progress.

XNUMX.Utilization of AI at our company

　We do not use ChatGPT or other similar services for routine patent searches due to information accuracy and security concerns.On the other hand, we have been collecting information and researching AI technology and AI tools for a long time, and have been developing and utilizing on-premise AI that does not use external servers for about five years.It has produced certain results as an internal search support tool.
　We will continue to monitor the development of AI technology and consider its effective use so that we can provide better services to our customers.

Research Division Shizuno