The Patent Doc blog summarized a new report from the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) that shows world patent filings grew by 7.8% in 2011, and China reached the top as judged by number of patent applications filed. Yes. China's State Intellectual Property Office (SIPO) became the world's largest by new applications with 526,412, followed by USPTO with 503,582 and JPO (Japan) with 342,610.
In the past 100 years, only 3 patent offices have ever led in the number of new applications -- those being US, Japan and Germany's Deutsches Patent and Marktnamt (DPMA). In 2011, 2.14 M applications were filed worldwide and this is the first time the 2 million mark has been breached.
Finally, with respect to country of origin, residents of Japan filed the largest number of applications worldwide (472,417), followed by Chinese residents and then US residents. Digital communications apps grew fastast at 8.1%, and biotech apps grew by 3%, while pharma actually dropped by 1.6%. So much for pharma R&D productivity! Japan also had the highest number of granted patents with 238,323 and was followed closely by the US with 224,505. Look for the Chinese to catch up here too in the near future.
Posted by Bruce Lehr Jan 17th 2013.
Comments