China became the world leader in international patent filings in 2019, unseating the US which had held the top spot for more than four decades, the UN said on April 7.

A record 265,800 international patent applications were filed last year, a hike of 5.2 per cent from 2018, the World Intellectual Property Organisation (WIPO) said in its annual report. 

China and the US were followed by Japan, Germany and South Korea as the world’s top patent application filers, WIPO said. 

WIPO’s complex system of registering international patents involves multiple categories. In the main category — the Patent Cooperation Treaty (PCT) — China topped the ranking for the first time, with 58,990 applications. It thus overtook the US, which filed 57,840 applications, and which has topped the PCT ranking since the system took effect in 1978. 

What is Patent Cooperation Treaty?

The Patent Cooperation Treaty (PCT) is an international treaty with more than 150 Contracting States. The PCT makes it possible to seek patent protection for an invention simultaneously in a large number of countries by filing a single “international” patent application instead of filing several separate national or regional patent applications. However, the granting of patents remains under the control of the national or regional patent offices. 

More applications from Asia

WIPO’s report showed Asian-based applicants accounting for 52.4 percent of all filings, while Europe and North America accounted for less than a quarter each.

“China’s rapid growth to become the top filer of international patent applications via WIPO underlines a long-term shift in the locus of innovation towards the East, with Asia-based applicants now accounting for more than half of all PCT applications,” WIPO director general Francis Gurry said in a statement. 

Gurry, who is due to step down at the end of September after 12 years at the WIPO helm, said that back in 1999 the organisation had received just 276 patent applications from China. Last year’s nearly 59,000 filings marked a “200-fold increase in only 20 years”, he said.

For the third consecutive year, China-based telecom giant Huawei Technologies topped the global ranking in 2019 with 4,411 PCT applications. This came despite a relentless campaign by Washington, which has lobbied allies worldwide to avoid the company’s telecoms gear over security concerns, in the shadow of a wider US-China trade conflict. 

It was followed by Mitsubishi Electric Corp of Japan, which made 2,661 filings, Samsung Electronics of South Korea with 2,334 filings and Qualcomm Inc of the US with 2,127 filings. 

While intellectual property increasingly finds itself at the heart of global competition, Gurry said that “it is important to remember that innovation is not a zero-sum game”. “A net increase in global innovation means new drugs, communications technologies, solutions for global challenges that benefit everyone, wherever they live,” he said. 

What is WIPO?

The World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) is the global forum for intellectual property (IP) services, policy, information and cooperation. It is a self-funding agency of the United Nations, with 193 member states. Its headquarters is situated in Geneva. 

WIPO promotes innovation and creativity for the economic, social and cultural development of all countries, through a balanced and effective international intellectual property system.

Its mission is to lead the development of a balanced and effective international IP system that enables innovation and creativity for the benefit of all. 

Its mandate, governing bodies and procedures are set out in the WIPO Convention, which established WIPO in 1967.

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