Global intellectual property applications and active IP rights.
Demand for IP rights continues...
Global filing activity for patents, utility models, trademarks and industrial designs increased in 2015. For patents and trademarks, this represented the sixth consecutive year that applications increased, while applications for utility models and industrial designs returned to growth after declines the previous year.
Asia received the bulk of world IP filings
The chart opposite shows the share of IP filing activity for each IP right across the world’s six geographical regions. IP offices in Asia received the highest numbers of applications for patents, utility models, trademarks and industrial designs, including 61.9% of all patent applications worldwide.
Note that North American offices do not offer utility model registration and so are not included in the figure for that IP right.
There are now well over 50 million IP rights in force
Around a quarter of all patents in force worldwide in 2015 were in the United States of America (U.S.), and nearly a fifth (18%) were in Japan. But China’s share is growing fast – the number of patents in force in China has leapt from about 600,000 in 2010 to almost 1.5 million.
And China accounts for more active trademarks than any other country (10.3 million), more than a third of all the world’s industrial design registrations in force and fully 90% of utility models in force globally.