IBM announced that it earned 4,186 U.S. patents in 2008, becoming the first company ever to earn more than 4,000 U.S. patents in a single year. IBM's 2008 patent issuances are nearly triple Hewlett-Packard’s and exceed the issuances of Microsoft, Hewlett-Packard, Oracle, Apple, EMC, Accenture and Google -- combined.
2008 U.S. Patent Leaders*
- IBM - 4186
- Samsung - 3515
- Canon - 2114
- Microsoft - 2030
- Intel - 1776
- Matsushita** - 1745
- Toshiba - 1609
- Fujitsu - 1494
- Sony - 1485
- HP - 1424
This is the 16th consecutive year IBM has led in U.S. patents (US).
IBM used the occasion to announce plans to help stimulate innovation and economic growth. The company plans to increase by 50% -- to more than 3,000 -- the number of technical inventions it publishes annually instead of seeking patent protection. This will make these inventions freely available to others.
“IBM's leadership in the strategic use of intellectual property is based on balancing proprietary and open innovation,” said Dr. John E. Kelly III, IBM senior vice president and director of IBM Research. “Our goal is helping stimulate innovation as public investments in large infrastructure projects are being planned to boost global economies. We also anticipate that adding additional transparency to the patent system will help tackle the continuing patent quality crisis, which is impeding inventors, entrepreneurs and companies of all sizes.”
While IBM will continue to seek patents and will protect its intellectual property, its planned increase in publishing inventions will focus on those technology areas that will increase the build out of a new, smarter infrastructure (US). The evolution of IBM's policy builds on prior efforts to stimulate innovation by pledging not to assert certain patent rights in the area of open source software, health care, education, the environment, and software interoperability.
For more information, please visit: ibm.com (US)