Intelligent System for Automated Molecular Patent Infringement Assessment

TL;DR

This paper presents PatentFinder, an advanced multi-agent system that accurately and interpretably assesses patent infringement risks in AI-generated molecules, supporting automated drug discovery.

Contribution

Introduction of PatentFinder, a multi-agent system with heuristic and model-based tools, and the creation of MolPatent-240 benchmark for patent infringement assessment.

Findings

PatentFinder outperforms baseline methods with a 13.8% higher F1-score.

Achieves a 12% increase in accuracy over existing approaches.

Generates detailed, interpretable infringement reports.

Abstract

Automated drug discovery offers significant potential for accelerating the development of novel therapeutics by substituting labor-intensive human workflows with machine-driven processes. However, molecules generated by artificial intelligence may unintentionally infringe on existing patents, posing legal and financial risks that impede the full automation of drug discovery pipelines. This paper introduces PatentFinder, a novel multi-agent and tool-enhanced intelligence system that can accurately and comprehensively evaluate small molecules for patent infringement. PatentFinder features five specialized agents that collaboratively analyze patent claims and molecular structures with heuristic and model-based tools, generating interpretable infringement reports. To support systematic evaluation, we curate MolPatent-240, a benchmark dataset tailored for patent infringement assessment algorithms. On this benchmark, PatentFinder outperforms baseline methods that rely solely on large language models or specialized chemical tools, achieving a 13.8% improvement in F1-score and a 12% increase in accuracy. Additionally, PatentFinder autonomously generates detailed and interpretable patent infringement reports, showcasing enhanced accuracy and improved interpretability. The high accuracy and interpretability of PatentFinder make it a valuable and reliable tool for automating patent infringement assessments, offering a practical solution for integrating patent protection analysis into the drug discovery pipeline.