Global Patent Filing Hits Record in 2021: WIPO


A record number of international patents were presented in 2021, with China Y Asia overall in the lead, a sign that the pandemic has not curtailed innovation, noted the United Nations Thursday.

In 2021 a total of 277,500 were registered international patent applicationswhich represents an increase of 0.9% compared to 2020, said the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO), dependent on the UN.

This is the twelfth consecutive year of growth in the number of patents.

“These figures demonstrate that human ingenuity and entrepreneurship remain strong despite the disruption caused by the pandemic,” said WIPO Director General Daren Tang.

The chief economist of this organization, Carsten Finkunderscored that “international patent applications continued to grow in 2020 and 2021 as the global pandemic unfolded and disrupted economies around the world.”

“This experience is remarkably different compared to previous economic crises,” he told reporters, noting that the figure fell during the 2009 financial crisis.

WIPO’s complex international patent registration system includes multiple categories. In the main, the Patent Cooperation Treaty (PCT), China remained in the lead with 69,540 applications.

This represents an increase of 0.9% compared to 2020. However, the figure for that year represented an increase of 16% compared to 2019, when the Asian giant surpassed the United States for the first time in this classification.

The North American powerhouse remained in second place with 59,570 patents, followed by Japan (50,260), South Korea (20,678) and Germany (17,322).

The UN agency highlights significant growth in less relevant actors such as Singapore (+23%) or Finland Y Turkey (+13% each).

The report shows that 54.1% of applications came from Asia, consolidating its growth from 38.5% a decade ago.

And for the fifth consecutive year, the Chinese telecommunications giant huawei leads the global ranking with 6,952 PCT applications, more than all of United Kingdom.

Then comes the American Qualcommthe South Koreans Samsung Y LG and the Japanese Mitsubishi.

By sectors, computing remained in the lead with a total of 9.9% of patents, followed by digital communication and the medical technology. The pharmaceutical sector registered a strong growth of 12.8% and the biotechnological one of 9.5 percent.

“We definitely see more dynamism in fields related to health technology,” Fink said.



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