Who Do We Invent For? Patents by Women Focus More on Women’s Health, but Few Women Get to Invent

The study by Koning et al. analyzed US biomedical patents from 1976 to 2010 and biomedical research articles from 2002 to 2020. It found that women are less likely to engage in commercial patenting, but when they do, their inventions are more likely to focus on women's health. Patents with all-female inventor teams are 35% more likely to focus on women's health than all-male teams. The study also found that research teams with more women are more likely to focus on women's health needs. If patents and research articles had been produced equally by men and women, there would have been around 6,500 more female-focused inventions and 40,000 more female-focused discoveries. The study suggests that the gender gap in inventing has resulted in many missing female-focused inventions and discoveries, indicating a potential untapped market opportunity to improve women's health.