Intangible assets play a significant role in other areas, in particular, developing the strategy and creating a patent portfolio for organizations (Wang, García, Guijarro, & Moya, 2011). In general, innovation can be considered as the engine for developing enterprise competitiveness. To this end, the research and development unit of organizations is focused on inventions and their legal protection (Lee, Park, & Jang, 2015). Today, a significant portion of the assets of organizations is intangible assets (Bishop, 2003). Intellectual property is typically defined as a set of products that are protected under the laws relating to patents, copyrights, trademarks, and trade secrets (Kumar, 1994). Studies show that three main advantages of patents, which add to the importance of their registration, are to encourage the creation of knowledge and innovation, to maintain knowledge in the organization, and to protect identity and characteristics of change (Kumar, 1994). Accordingly, determining the value of patents is a critical factor which plays a vital role in the success of organizations (Anderson, 1992). A patent is a set of exclusive rights granted by a country to an inventor for a limited period, in exchange for detailed public disclosure of the invention (WIPO, 2008). Organizations own a large number of these registered technologies and inventions (PCT, 2011). Successful exploitation and management of these patents is a critical factor in the business strategy of the organization (IP4Inno, 2008). In this regard, patent valuation and prioritization is one of the main activities related to the management of intellectual property assets in an organization. Indeed, knowing the economic value and the importance of intellectual property rights helps to make strategic decisions about the assets of the organization and also facilitates intellectual property commercialization and transactions (IP4Inno, 2008).

The correct and accurate valuation of patents is a concern that has led many researchers to identify the criteria for this purpose (Lee & Sohn, 2016; Fischer & Leidinger, 2014). There are different approaches to value and prioritize patents (Parr & Smith, 1994), including costoriented (Drews, 2001), market-oriented (Daryl & Drews, 2006), income-oriented (Kamiyama, Sheehan, & Martinez, 2006) and real options approach (Pitkethly, 1999). These methods cannot calculate the economic value of patents and intangible assets, and their results are different (Young-Ki, Seung-Jun, & Seong-Taek, 2016). In particular, the cost-oriented approach does not have the ability to calculate potential future profit; market-oriented approach can be measured in theory, but in practice, there is generally no market to compare the value of the desired patent; and the income-oriented method is also valid in opinion, but in practice there is no ability to calculate future cash flow (Hytönen & Jarimo, 2010). On the other hand, researchers have found that valuation and prioritization of patents are not sufficient enough if we only consider a particular criterion (forward citations, backward citations, patent’s life, etc.)(Reitzig, 2004). Accordingly, a wide range of criteria should be considered for this purpose (Wang, García, Guijarro, & Moya, 2011). Given the need to address different rules and the difference between the importance of each of these criteria, multi-attribute decision-making (MADM) methods can be beneficial (Chiu & Chen, 2007; Dahooie, Vanaki, Mohammadi, & Firoozfar, 2018). MADM approaches make