Early Identification of Significant Patents Using Heterogeneous Applicant-Citation Networks Based on the Chinese Green Patent Data

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

The research workload of this manuscript is adequate and well written, but the following issues for improvement remain.

The authors emphasize the importance of evaluating the quality and value of patents, but regard the China Patent Award as the basis for evaluating important patents. From a practical point of view, this is hardly convincing, and at least a distinction should be made between gold, silver, and excellent awards. The authors can justify the use of the China Patent Award in more detail by citing the necessary literature. In addition, please note that the abbreviation "SIPO" has long been replaced by "CNIPA."

The conclusion section is too short. Consider combining the conclusion section with the discussion section, and the future research directions should be placed at the end.

The citation format in the main text is wrong and should use the numbering format.

Author Response

Please see the attachment.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 2 Report

Nice work. The paper uses an innovative dataset of Chinese green patents analyzed via patent citation network methodology.

Some of the "classic" papers in the field should be added; e.g. please add:

Trajtenberg, M. (1990). A penny for your quotes: patent citations and the value of innovations. The Rand journal of economics, 172-187.

Further editing is needed: page 14, line 491 & p.20, l. 674 (and elsewhere).

Author Response

Please see the attachment.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 3 Report

The manuscript should be re-reviewed after removing the problems:

- A native English edition should be done and submitted.

- The final outputs must be reported statistically and numerically in the abstract.

- The motivations of the manuscript should be listed in the introduction.

- Section 2 should finally be summarized and presented in the form of a comprehensive table.

- The quality of all figures should be improved.

- Top results should be highlighted.

- All abbreviations and variables should be listed in two separate tables in an appendix.

- The complete specifications of the software or hardware systems used must be reported.

- A detailed paragraph of future work should be added to the conclusion.

- Final outputs can be compared and verified with several recent relevant references.

- It is better to provide several effective and concise highlights for the manuscript .

Author Response

Please see the attachment.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Round 2

Reviewer 3 Report

The quality of figures should be improved.