Sinopec, China's top oil refiner, obtained the most number of patents with 2,844, according to SIPO data. (Photo : www.insideevs.com)
Official data revealed on Thursday, Jan. 14, showed that China has handled more patent applications for inventions than any other country for the fifth year running in 2015, the Xinhua News Agency reported.
Data from the State Intellectual Property Office (SIPO) showed that more than 1.1 million patent applications were filed in China last year, up 18.7 percent year on year.
Gong Yalin, an official with the SIPO, said in a press conference that about 359,000 invention patents were authorized, 263,000 of which were granted to domestic applicants, 100,000 more than in 2014.
Gong added that this brought the number of invention patents owned by every 100,000 Chinese to 6.3. He said that out of all the invention patents authorized in 2015, 60.5 percent were from Chinese enterprises, an annual increase of 4.1 percent.
Among all Chinese firms, the country's top oil refiner Sinopec obtained the most number with 2,844 patents, followed by telecom giants ZTE and Huawei.
The report said that many Chinese had embraced innovation as a new source of growth in the face of the slowing and upgrading economy.
The government has also offered high-tech companies with favorable policies to support and encourage investment into research and development. In late October, the Communist Party of China also made innovation as one of five key concepts of development for the period of 2016-2020.
According to SIPO data, the number of patent applications filed for inventions in China more than doubled in the past five years.
Gong said, however, that despite the overall increase in patent applications, China still lags behind foreign countries in some fields, such as optics and engines.
Data from the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) showed that innovators filed a total of 2.57 million patent applications worldwide in 2013, a 9 percent increase from 2012.
According to WIPO, China accounts for 32.1 percent of the world total, while the U.S. received more than half of global filings with 22.3 percent. The share of the European Patent Office (EPO) in the world total fell to 5.8 percent.
In 2013, WIPO listed the top three patent applicants as China, with 825,136 filings, followed by the U.S. with 571,612 and Japan with 328,436.
