Thomson Scientific Redesigns Patent Database to Enhance Search Quality and Efficiency

Philadelphia, PA USA, London UK, 10/04/2006, Thomson Scientific, part of The Thomson Corporation (NYSE: TOC; TSX: TOC) and leading provider of information solutions to the worldwide research and business communities, today announced that it has enhanced the full text patent collections in its Aureka® and PatentWeb® products to include enriched data indexing, new search and display fields and additional patent coverage. The enhancements allow patent researchers to retrieve more complete results with greater flexibility and precision.

Aureka, an advanced intellectual property management and analysis platform, and PatentWeb, an online repository housing the world’s largest commercial collection of patent data, are part of Thomson Scientific’s product portfolio that support the research and development needs of organizations worldwide.

“Intellectual property continues to grow as a key strategic asset for many organizations, and Thomson Scientific is dedicated to providing tools that increase efficiency and return on investment for our customers,” said David Brown, executive vice president of Corporate Markets, Thomson Scientific. “In addition to the immediate benefits for Aureka and PatentWeb customers, we will build on these improvements to support Thomson Scientific’s next generation of intellectual property solutions.”

Brown added: “Our products are developed in tandem with our customers, and these enhancements provide several user-requested improvements, while also anticipating the future needs of intellectual property researchers.”

The reloaded patent data tier is housed in a state-of-the-art data center, and represents a multi-million dollar investment in hardware, software and content, and demonstrates Thomson Scientific’s commitment to meeting customer needs.

Enhancements implemented on Aureka and PatentWeb, include:

* More publication types
* Increased coverage of Japanese and British patent data
* Improved coverage for more complete search results, including ECLA codes, correspondent information and additional post-issuance data
* Normalization of key elements to ensure accurate and complete retrieval of data, including patent and application numbers, assignee/applicant names and classification codes
* Enhanced indexing for more precise search results and proximity searching, including elimination of stopwords and markup

For more detailed information about new data and features, visit one of the following information pages:

* Aureka – http://thomsonscientific.com/products/aureka/enhance
* PatentWeb – http://thomsonscientific.com/products/patentweb/enhance

About The Thomson Corporation

The Thomson Corporation (www.thomson.com), with 2005 revenues of approximately $8.40 billion, is a global leader in providing integrated information solutions to business and professional customers. Thomson provides value-added information, software tools and applications to more than 20 million users in the fields of law, tax, accounting, financial services, higher education, reference information, corporate e-learning and assessment, scientific research and healthcare. With operational headquarters in Stamford, Conn., Thomson has approximately 40,500 employees and provides services in approximately 130 countries. The Corporation’s common shares are listed on the New York and Toronto stock exchanges (NYSE: TOC; TSX: TOC).

Thomson Scientific is a business of The Thomson Corporation. Its information solutions assist professionals at every stage of research and development—from discovery to analysis to product development and distribution. Thomson scientific information solutions can be found at scientific.thomson.com.

Contact Information

Allison Hagan

Director, Public Relations and Communications

Thomson Scientific

Contact via E-mail