Patents Issued per 100,000 Employees by State, FY 2004-2009

U.S. patent activity increased in 2009, after two years of reduced activity, according to statistics from the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO). U.S. applicants were awarded 95,037 patents in 2009, up from 92,001 in 2008. Last year marked a return to the patenting levels of the early part of the decade, though in 2006 the country had hit an anomalous all-time high with 102,267 patents.

About a quarter (24.6 percent) of all U.S. patent activity in 2009 occurred in California, a share that has grown steadily over the past 15 years. Californians were issued 23,354 patents last year, up from 22,203 in 2009. Other top states include Texas (6,436 patents), New York (6,127), Washington (4,856) and Massachusetts (4,038). Together, the top five states produced 46 percent of all U.S. patents. Japan received the highest number of U.S patents of any foreign country with 38,066 patents in 2009.

View the USPTO's Patent Counts by Country/State and Year, All Patents, All Types, January 1, 1977 - December 31, 2009 at: http://www.uspto.gov/web/offices/ac/ido/oeip/taf/cst_all.pdf.

SSTI has prepared a table of U.S. patents issued per 100,000 employees by state between FY 2004-2009. The table also includes rankings for each year and the percentage change over the entire five-year period. Overall, U.S. patenting per 100,000 employees increased 8.4 percent last year, and 2.4 percent between 2004 and 2009. The data reveals few geographic trends, though the three states with the greatest decrease in patenting activity per employee over the five-year period were in the U.S. Mountain region. Idaho, South Dakota and Montana experienced the largest relative declines, though South Dakota's and Montana's generally low patenting rates render the losses less remarkable.

View SSTI's table of patenting per 100,000 employees by state for FY 2004-2009 at: http://www.ssti.org/Digest/Tables/102710t.htm.

Following several years of remarkable growth, Washington emerged as a leader in patenting per employee last year for the first time. For the five-year period between 2004 and 2009, the state increased its patent per employee figure by almost 90 percent. In 2004, Washington produced 90.6 patents per 100,000 employees in 2004, which grew to 171.2 patents in 2009. Increased patenting activity at Microsoft, and to some extent Boeing, drove the state's rise from its position as the 12th most active patenting state per employee to the national leader. Washington also had the highest rate of growth of any state during the five-year period.

Vermont ranked a close second for patenting activity employee last year, with 171 patents per 100,00 workers. The state also had the third highest growth rate for patenting since 2004. Patent activity at IBM led to the high level of growth and the state's consistently high level of patenting.

While Idaho remains one of the leading states for patenting per employee, its patenting rate has decreased by 48 percent over the past five years. In 2004, the state received 308.1 patents per 100,000 workers, which declined steadily to 160.5 patents in 2009. As of last year, Idaho is the third most active patenting state per employee, down from its former place as national leader. Much of the change in Idaho's level of activity is due to reduced patenting at Micron Technology and Hewlett-Packard, both of which have decreased their Idaho activity in recent years.