2006 Was Record Year For International Patent Filings, Says WIPO

by Ulrika Lomas, for LawAndTax-News.com, Brussels

09 February 2007

The World Intellectual Property Organization's (WIPO) Patent Cooperation Treaty (PCT) saw a record 145,3001 applications filed in 2006, representing a 6.4% growth over the previous year.

According to WIPO, the most remarkable growth rates came from countries in north east Asia for the third year running, and represented over a quarter (25.3%) of all international applications under the PCT.

In 2006, the list was topped by applications from the United States of America (USA), Japan, Germany, the Republic of Korea and France.

“The number of international patent applications continues to rise with impressive growth from north east Asian countries. Increasingly developing country economies are capitalizing on the tools of the intellectual property system for wealth creation,” observed Francis Gurry, Deputy Director General who oversees the work of the PCT.

He continued:

"Innovation has been traditionally dominated by Europe and North America. New centers of innovation – in particular in northeast Asia - are emerging and this is transforming both the geography of the patent system and of future global economic growth."

WIPO revealed that the Republic of Korea, which experienced 26.6% growth in 2006 as compared to 2005, overtook the United Kingdom and France to become the 4th biggest country of origin of PCT filings, and applicants from China, whose use grew by 56.8%, dislodged Switzerland and Sweden to take the position of 8th largest country of origin.

With just under 50,000 PCT applications, inventors and industry from the United States of America represented 34.1% (a 6.1% increase over 2005) of all applications in 2006.

Applicants from Japan, who unseated their German counterparts in 2003 for the number two spot, maintained their second place position with 18.5% of the total number of applications, representing an 8.3% increase.

Inventors and industry from Germany held third position with 11.7% of all applications in 2006, representing a 5.8% increase, followed by users in the Republic of Korea (4.1% of all applications and a 26.6% increase) and France (4.1% of all applications and a 2.8% increase).

Among the fifteen top filing countries, others to achieve double-digit rates of growth were Italy (11th highest filer, with a rate of growth of 16.1% in 2006) and Israel (15th highest filer, with a rate of growth of 18.3% in 2006).

The Organization went on to announce that the top 5 applicants remain unchanged in 2006. 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).

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