China continues to rank first in the world in terms of PCT international patent applications (March 2021)

According to the latest report released by the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) on March 2, 2021, the number of international patent applications filed in China through the Patent Cooperation Treaty (PCT) route reached 68,720 in 2020, which increased 16.1% from the previous year and held on to the top rank in the world.  In 2019, China led the world in PCT international patent applications by surpassing the United States for the first time.

The report notes that the number of international patent applications filed by global applicants in 2020 continued to grow, despite the impact of the Covid-19 outbreak.  In 2020, the number of international PCT patent applications worldwide increased by 4% to 275,900, the highest number ever recorded. Among them, the top five countries in terms of the number of PCT international patent applications were China (68,720), the United States (59,230), Japan (50,520), South Korea (20,060) and Germany (18,643); the top five countries in terms of the number of international trademark applications submitted through the Madrid system were the United States (10,005), Germany (7,334), China (7,075), France (3,716) and the United Kingdom (3,679).  Among the top 10 countries by application origin, China is the only country to achieve double-digit growth in 2020, with a year-over-year increase of 16.4%.

In addition, according to the classification of PCT international patent applicants, Chinese enterprises and universities performed remarkably. In 2020, the number of PCT international patent applications filed by Huawei Technologies of China was 5,464, ranking first for the fourth consecutive year, followed by Samsung Electronics of South Korea, Mitsubishi Electric Corporation of Japan, LG Electronics Inc. of South Korea and Qualcomm Inc. of the United States. Among the top ten universities in terms of PCT international patent applications, five were from China, namely Shenzhen University, Tsinghua University, Zhejiang University, Dalian University of Technology and South China University of Technology.

Adapted from China IP News website