Nearly 1.9 million patent applications were filed at the world’s five largest patent offices last year, according to the latest statistical report published by the European Patent Office (EPO), the Japan Patent Office (JPO), the Korean Intellectual Property Office (KIPO), the State Intellectual Property Office of the People’s Republic of China (SIPO) and the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO), collectively known as the five IP offices, or IP5. This represents a growth of 11% over 2011.
The 2012 edition of the IP5 Statistics Report also finds that altogether the IP5 offices granted almost 924 000 patents for inventions in 2012, an increase of 17% compared to 2011.
The IP5 offices have worked together closely since 2007 to improve efficiency and address the growing backlogs in applications worldwide.
For further information you may visit: http://www.epo.org/news-issues/news/2013/20131122.html
Source: EPO
