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Top Countries Shuffle Spots for Most Patents
Rapid growth in the number of international patents filed by northeast Asian nations during 2006 has resulted in a shift of positions for the top-performing nations, according to the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO). With 34.1 percent, the U.S. maintained its global dominance with 49,555 patent filings. The figure represents an increase of 6.1 percent over America’s 2005 total; the U.S. rate of growth is slower than the 6.4 percent growth in total world filings.
Japan, maintaining its second place position, filed 26,906 patent applications, 18.5 percent of the global total of 145,300. Germany remained in third with 11.7 percent of the total.
Changes to the remaining rankings in the top 10 reflect the rapid growth of patent activity in Korea and China. The Republic of Korea, which experienced 26.6 percent growth in 2006 over the prior year, overtook the United Kingdom and France to become the fourth-biggest country of origin of filings, and applicants from China, whose use grew by 56.8 percent, dislodged Switzerland and Sweden to take the position of eighth-largest country of origin. The number of patent filings in the United Kingdom and the Netherlands for 2006 decreased from figures reported in 2005.
The top five applicant companies remain unchanged. The Dutch multinational Philips Electronics N.V. was again the largest applicant (2,495 applications published in 2006), followed by Matsushita (Japan, 2,344), Siemens (Germany, 1,480), Nokia (Finland, 1,036), and Bosch (Germany, 962). These were followed by 3M (U.S., 727), BASF (Germany, 714), Toyota (Japan, 704), Intel (U.S., 690), and Motorola (U.S., 637). Among the 20 top filing companies, seven were from the U.S., four from Japan and three from Germany.
Several companies join the top 20 list, including Huawei (China), up 24 places to 13th, Fujitsu (Japan), up 9 places to 15th, LG Electronics (Republic of Korea) up 12 to 16th, and Hewlett-Packard (U.S.) up five to 18th.
More information, including the breakdown by technology sector, is available on the WIPO website: http://www.wipo.int/edocs/prdocs/en/2007/wipo_pr_2007_476.html