A recent article in the online version of China’s People’s Daily reports that telecom equipment giant Huawei is now the leading source of new patent applications under the Patent Cooperation Treaty (PCT). Huawei had the highest number of new patent filings, with a total of 1737 applications in 2008. After Huawei, the next most prolific patent filers were Panasonic (Japan), Philips Electronics NV (Netherlands), Toyota (Japan) and Robert Bosch GMBH (Germany).
Interestingly, while no U.S. company was in the top 5 of patent application filers, the U.S. still ranked first in the world with over 53,000 new fillings. This would seem to suggest that much of the innovation occurring within the U.S. is presently coming from small and medium size company filers, as opposed to larger enterprises. It may well be that in light of the current economic situation, larger technology companies in the U.S. are cutting back on patent filing programs to conserve cash. A good decision in the short run perhaps; but not necessarily the best decision for the long run…
The People’s Daily article may be found at http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2009-02/03/content_10757403.htm.
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