IBM's patent blitz

Stephen Withers
Thursday, 15 January 2009 06:08

IT Industry - Strategy

IBM racked up an impressive 4186 US patents during 2008 - the first time a company has been granted more than 4000 patents in a calendar year.

IBM has long been one of the IT industry's intellectual powerhouses. For sixteen consecutive years no other company - regardless of industry - has received more US patent approvals.

Microsoft is another company that likes to trumpet its patent leadership, having been at the top of the Institute of Electrical and Electronic Engineers' patent scorecard two years running.

But Microsoft was granted less than half as many US patents as IBM was last year - 2030 to be precise. (The most recent IEEE patent scorecard appears to based on US patents issued in 2007.)

The list of the top 10 US patent recipients for 2008 is completely dominated by companies at least partly involved in the IT and electronics industries:

1 IBM 4186

2 Samsung 3515

3 Canon 2114

4 Microsoft 2030

5 Intel 1776

6 Matsushita/Panasonic 1745

7 Toshiba 1609

8 Fujitsu 1494

9 Sony 1485

10 HP 1424

Continued