Chinese exceptionalism?: China files most patent applications

[No Elephants]

Published: Dec. 12, 2012 at 1:46 AM

GENEVA, Switzerland, Dec. 12 (UPI) -- China registered 526,412 patent applications in 2011, the highest for any nation, taking the world total to more than 2 million, a U.N. report said.

The World Intellectual Property Organization, a U.N. intellectual property agency headquartered in Geneva, said the United States came in second with 503,582 applications, and Japan third with 342,610 applications last year.

The agency in its World Intellectual Property Indicators 2012 said it was the first time global patent filings had passed the 2 million mark, adding the filings would benefit the global economy.

"Sustained growth in IP filings indicates that companies continue to innovate despite weak economic conditions," said agency Director General Francis Gurry. "This is good news, as it lays the foundation for the world economy to generate growth and prosperity in the future."

<snip>

"Even though caution is required in directly comparing IP filing figures across countries, these trends nevertheless reflect how the geography of innovation has shifted," Gurry said in the report's foreword.

Patent filings across the world grew by 7.8 per cent in 2011, the second year in a row when growth exceeded 7 percent, the report said. It followed a 3.6 per cent decline in 2009 in the wake of the global financial crisis.

<snip>


"Residents of Japan filed the largest number of applications relating to solar energy and fuel cell technologies, while residents of Germany and the U.S. accounted for the largest numbers of applications relating to geothermal and wind energy, respectively," the report said

Read more: http://www.upi.com/Top_News/World-News/2012/12/12/China-files-most-patent-applications/UPI-32681355294811/#ixzz2EpXGssKk


Worldwide, patents for digital communication and renewable energy technologies increased most, with Japan leading filings relating to solar energy and fuel cell technologies. (Is that because of Japan's nuclear plant disaster?) Patents for pharmaceuticals, however, declined since 2007. (Will that mean yet higher U.S. prices for pharmaceuticals?)


Remind me who the world's biggest copyright and patent pirateers are.


The parts of the world economy that gets to exploit these patents will prosper. The parts of the world that get to be only consumers, not necessarily so much.

[Enthusiast]

1. It is both encouraging and disappointing that

patents on renewable energy technologies increased most.

The United States of America carries on under yet another false media narrative (like 9/11 and Iraq) that global warming is a hoax. Even if climate change is arrested in the future the American people will still suffer for allowing a fossil fuel dominated corporate media.

[No Elephants]

3. I thought we had progressed from global warming does not exist

to globabl warming exists, but is part of nature's cycles, and the human contribution to it, if any, is neglible.

Meh. It's irrelevant. As long as we don't try to regulate the job creators, I'm good with the extinction of the human species.

:sarcasm:

[Poll_Blind]

2. What I can't help but thinking of is a scenario where basically the...

...Chinese can continue to turn a blind eye to massive copyright violations yet (and here's the kicker) still make sure their patents are enforced in the WTO- or whatever organization handles and enforces such things.

IIRC, it's the WTO, and it has a mother-shitload of power.

PB

[formercia]

4. Patents are worthless, unless you have the means to defend them.

I found that out the hard way. I spent a lot of Money for nothing.

All it does, is give you an edge in Court. To top it off, one has to file the same patent in other countries as well, otherwise you have no protection in that Country. Look at Apple and Samsung as an example.

I prefer Trade Secrets. Keeping my own counsel has served me very well.

[No Elephants]

5. Good point on trade secrets.

Most legal rights are worth only the paper on which they are wrriten, unless you can pursue them in court.

That is why organizations like the ACLU are so very important.