How can you keep track of innovations made by your competitors? Do you even know who all your competitors are? Monitoring patenting activity can help, but there are limitations. Surprises can still happen, sometimes from unexpected quarters.
June 2025. Another week, another news article with a colourful photograph of a rocket exploding. But as news feeds were focussed on the latest ‘Starship’ blow-up as SpaceX doubled down on its fail fast, learn fast methodology, the attention of much of the space industry was elsewhere. To northern Japan, where a day earlier a prototype rocket had risen some 300m into the air and, a minute later, redeployed its landing gear and landed flawlessly a short distance away. The technology was undoubtedly impressive, but the most newsworthy aspect was the identity of the company behind it.
Since the first commercial launch system was offered by Arianespace in the 1980s, arguably the greatest advances have come from SpaceX, who first demonstrated the result of a decade of development by launching a reusable rocket in 2015. Since then, SpaceX has become by far the dominant player with currently over 100 orbital launches a year. It has also inspired numerous start-ups. But the new rocket was not from any of those. The unexpected new entrant in the reusable rocket space was the venerable Japanese car manufacturer: Honda¹.
What was ostensibly a car company doing launching a reusable rocket? And could anyone have seen this coming?
The monitoring of patents – and in particular the filing of new patent applications – is often presented as a key tool for competitor intelligence. What areas are your competitors working on? What new innovations have there been in your field? Have there been any new entrants? Patents are by design a good source of technical information; to secure a patent monopoly requires full disclosure of the workings of the invention, which nowadays is readily available on free public databases.
However, patent monitoring is an imperfect tool. The language can be obscure, a dense mix of technical and legalese, sometimes deliberately so. Subject classifications are not always appropriate. The ultimate corporate owners can be difficult to determine. And patent applications typically only publish 18 months after the initial filing, so any such monitoring is inevitably somewhat behind the curve.
Another reason to be wary is that the incentives to file patent applications differ; what works for start-ups is not always appropriate for more established companies. The former tend to file early in the innovation process to indicate commercial potential, secure investment, and to protect their key innovation ahead of any public demonstration. We can see this with the large number of reusable rocket start-ups with a handful of patent filings, perhaps some successful ground-based test firings, but as yet no successful launches. Large companies (or those with more secure funding) tend to have a broader technological base and no need to engage in such market signalling.
Leaving aside ideological reasoning (Elon Musk once famously quipped that patents are “for the weak” and claimed SpaceX was a patent-free company; a position since evidently revised), for some companies, the very requirement to disclose in full details of the invention is seen as a drawback, allowing competitors an unwanted innovation leg-up. Instead, development is undertaken largely in secret, with intellectual property being protected through corporate culture – or in case that fails, formally buttressed via strict non-disclosure employment contracts and the potential for litigation.
Honda seems to be adopting this secrecy approach, at least initially. Since first declaring an interest in developing space technologies in 2019, they have kept a low profile. Footage of an earlier rocket test firing was only shown in grainy black-and-white, possibly to avoid disclosing details of the propellant.
They evidently take patents seriously, however. Established in the 1940s, Honda is one of the largest automobile manufacturers in the world, with vast experience in combustion technology, fluid handling, etc., and a large R&D department with a reported willingness to allow young engineers opportunities to work on projects of their own. For the past two decades, Honda has filed over 1,000 patent applications a year.
Honda also has prior form in diversifying into other technology areas, whether done primarily as a proof-of-concept and public-relations exercise (as with the ASIMO humanoid robot programme, since discontinued) or commercially. Honda has, for example, a successful side line in business jets and a small portfolio of aviation-related patents.
That said, Honda seems unlikely to be aiming to compete with SpaceX as a commercial launch provider. Rather, this may be a case of vertical integration, a company looking to support its core business by moving into adjacent technologies. Honda may in time provide its own satellite links for ‘connected vehicles’, avoiding over-reliance on the present dominant supplier (Starlink again).
Whatever the reason, Honda could well become a major force in the intellectual property of space, following similar industrial giants such as Toyota, Mitsubishi, and Hyundai, all of which have been building space-related patent portfolios.
So if your company is warily eyeing existing competitors and wondering where the next threat might come from, how can you anticipate competition arising from established companies crossing over from other sectors?
- Be aware that innovation and competition not only come from smaller companies and startups. Not all large companies are dinosaurs.
- Appreciate that patent monitoring is important but also imperfect and so must be part of a wider analysis.
- Take public pronouncements seriously. Whereas start-ups seek to make headlines, larger
companies may be indicating a deliberate strategy. - Identify companies with the means, motive, and opportunity to vertically integrate or diversify.
- Note when unexpected new entrants move into your technology area and consider whether there are similar companies which might do likewise.
You may also wish to consult with your patent attorney. Despite the drawbacks with patent monitoring, there are sometimes faint signals which a patent attorney might identify. A couple of years ago, a Honda patent application was published with the intriguing title “Landing gear for flight vehicle”. There was no mention in the patent specification of space or the launching of rockets. But a remarkably similar landing gear was seen deployed a few weeks ago in northern Japan.
