The article is devoted to the analysis and the choice of the priorities in technology development and, particularly, to the use of patent landscaping as a tool for the study of technology trends. Currently, patent activity indicators are often used for technology foresight and for competitive intelligence as well. Nevertheless, causal relationship between these indicators, on the one hand, and strategic and tactical decisions in the sphere of technological development on meso- and microeconomic level, on the other hand, are not adequately investigated to solve practical tasks. The goal of the work is to systemize the challenges of technology trends analysis, which could be effectively solved on the base of patent landscape analysis. The article analyses the patent landscaping methodology and tools, as well as their use for evaluating the current competitive environment and technology foresight. The authors formulated the generalized classification for the criteria of promising technologies for a selected region. To assess the compliance of a technology with these criteria, we propose a system of corresponding indicators of patenting activity. Using the proposed methodology, we have analysed the patent landscape to select promising technologies for the Sverdlovsk region. The research confirmed the hypothesis of the patent landscapes performance in evaluating such technology indicators as stages of the life cycle stage, universality (applicability in different industries), pace of worldwide development, innovations and science availability in the region and potential possibilities for scientific collaboration with international research institutions and universities. The results of the research may be useful to the wide audience, including representatives small and medium enterprises, large companies and regional authorities for the tasks concerned with the technology trends analysis and technology strategy design

The high level of uncertainty in the Russian pharmaceutical competitive environment creates a necessity of using open data that indicate the degree of the organizations’ technological competencies. The Analysis of the information on the organizations’ localization in the regions allows generating a regional competence profile, which can be used to plan the drugs’ production. The study aims to analyse the distribution of technological competencies in the Russian regions by assessing the prospects for locating production sites of foreign and Russian organizations specialising in the antidiabetic drugs development. We hypothesise that the analysis of the distribution of technological competencies in the regions reduces the market’s uncertainty for deciding on the localization of the socially significant industries. The research model is based on the methods of average-weighted, ranking and categorical analysis of the patent and registration data for shaping the regional competence profiles. The implementation of this method of analysing the organizations’ technological competencies is showed on the example of 18 regions that have production sites of antidiabetic drugs. We substantiated the allocation of 5 types of regional profiles, characterised by similar opportunities and threats for new participants in the pharmaceutical market. We revealed that the model of the cooperation behaviour should consider the technological profile at the regional level. At the same time, the model of competitive behaviour to a much lesser extent depends on the regional characteristics of localized production. The methods of constructing the region’s patent and product ratings and their categorization (with allocation of typical behaviour models) allow determining the technological opportunities for increasing the availability and quality of the Russian pharmaceutical products. Moreover, such methods allow identifying the prospects for long-term cooperation with technological leaders at the regional and industrial levels. That is especially important for implementing the concept of the national drug safety and increasing the availability of the socially significant drugs.