Abstract:Clarifying the evolution stage of enterprise"s intellectual property capability is the basic premise of cultivating enterprises" intellectual property capability. Based on the theory of capability life cycle and the theory of continuous and discontinuous innovation, the evolution of enterprise"s intellectual property capability can be divided into four stages: incubation stage, growth stage, plateau stage and transition stage. On the basis of analysing the characteristics of each stage from the aspects of intellectual property resource endowment, intellectual property organization construction, intellectual property awareness and intellectual property activities, The paper proposes a method which is generally applicable to identify the evolution stage of enterprises" intellectual property capability by combining the industry life cycle division method with curve fitting, and applies to sample enterprises.