Record number of granted European patents

Strong growth and positive performance trends at EPO

Brussels, 4 June 2004 - - The European Patent Office (EPO) can point to another major achievement in its history: last year, it granted nearly 60 000 European patents, 27% more than in 2002. Incoming filings totalled 162 200, slightly up (1.1%) on the figure for 2002 (160 430). Again, about 50% of applications came from member states of the European Patent Organisation, 27% from the USA (2002: 28%) and 16% from Japan (2002: 15%). The main technical fields involved were medical technology, electronic communications and data processing.

"Over the last eight years, the European Patent Office has continued to improve its efficiency and effectiveness", said the outgoing EPO President, Dr h.c. Ingo Kober, reviewing the key aspects of his presidency at the 2004 annual press conference. For example, patent filings have risen by 110% since 1995 (79 200), and the number of patents granted by 46% over the same period. One driving force behind this headlong growth is the WTO's world trade system, in which the protection of intellectual property plays a central role: "These figures show that European patents have proved highly effective for protecting innovation in Europe", said the EPO President. Following Poland's accession in April, the European Patent Organisation now has 28 member states, 10 more than in 1995, and European patents thus cover a market of over 500 million people. More countries will be joining in the near future.

This growth in filings has given rise to a large increase, over the same period, in demand for EPO services at all stages in the European patent grant procedure. The Office has met this challenge by stepping up its production figures. Ingo Kober, presenting key EPO performance figures, highlighted the fact that "since 1997, we have increased our productivity across the board by 17%, and cut unit costs by 8%". The cornerstones of this improved performance include a process of far-reaching reform to internal structures - such as bringing patent searching and substantive examination together - expansion of electronic dossier management and documentation systems, and a rigorous recruitment policy.

Some 3 400 of the EPO's current workforce of 6 080 people (up by 64% from 3 700 in 1995) are examiners, 85% more than in 1995. That the EPO still faces large backlogs is due mainly to disproportionately high growth in international patent applications.

According to Dr Kober, "Today, most applicants have worldwide filing strategies and use the international Patent Cooperation Treaty (PCT). A PCT application can give an applicant cover in virtually all the industrialised states. Euro-PCT applications now account for over two thirds of our filings".

The PCT's tight time limits require the EPO to give priority to international applications, causing backlogs with European cases. But the EPO's heavy workload is not unique: filings have been flooding in and causing serious backlogs at all major patent offices.

To clear these backlogs, in October 2002 the EPO implemented a set of measures which has already had an impact: "In most technical fields, things are now back to normal. The same will apply to the remaining fields in the foreseeable future."

The EPO is also making progress in its efforts to reduce European patent grant times, from just under four and a half years at present to the three-year target set by its member states. In the first quarter of this year, over 22% of applications were processed within that period.