European Patent Office takes a tougher stance on quality as European patent applications continue to rise

Brussels/Munich, 17 March 2009 - The number of European patent applications has continued to increase in 2008, albeit at a much lower level. The European Patent Office received a total of 146 600 patent applications last year, compared with 141 400 in 2007 (+3.6%). The grant rate for European patents dropped for the first time to less than 50% (49.5%; 2007: 51%).

Alison Brimelow, President of the EPO, underlined the need for an effective quality policy in patents: "The purpose of patents is to facilitate economic benefits for society by creating legal certainty in the market. We therefore need to continue to ensure quality in the patenting procedure. Some efforts in this respect are now beginning to bear fruit: The practice we introduced in 2004 of informing applicants early in the process of their prospects of obtaining a patent visibly encourages companies in many cases to abandon their applications. Subsequently, the strict application of patentability criteria by our patent examiners has led to more refusals to grant a patent. These are important steps to ensure the relevance of the patents entering the innovation process."

The EPO's patent examiners conducted 120 900 examination procedures, 59 800 of which ended with the grant of a European patent. In 22 per cent of the proceedings the applicants abandoned their procedure after receiving a first opinion on the patentability of their invention following a state of the art search. A full 28 per cent of the examination procedures ended either with a withdrawal by the applicant or a refusal of the application by the EPO. With 4 500 cases, the number of refusals has increased by 42 per cent over 2007.

Overall growth, but fluctuation in the filing activities

In relation with the impact of the economic crisis on the development of patent filings, EPO President Alison Brimelow said: "Despite the overall growth the signals are mixed. There was an unusually high fluctuation in filing activity from all regions of origin in the second half of 2008. Moreover, we have noted a lower growth in applications from Japan, and a clear downturn in filings originating from South Korea. The mixed picture continues in 2009."

The proportion of applications originating from the 34 member states of the European Patent Organisation grew to reach 49.3% (2007: 48.5%) Germany once again topped the table with 18.2% of the total (26 653 applications, (+5.8%), followed by France with 6.2% (9 050, +8.3%) and the Netherlands with 5% (7 289; +2.4%).

Compared with 2007, filings from most countries continued to rise, those from Sweden by 15% (3 140), from Denmark by 13,3% (1 586) and from Austria by 8% (1 492).

The filing activity also increased significantly in other European states such as Ireland (484 applications; +14.4%),) Poland, which rose by 60.6% to 167 applications, Slovenia (129 applications; +12.2%) and the Czech Republic (111 applications, +15.6%).

Lower growth from Japan, downturn from Korea

As for non-European countries, the USA and Japan maintained their dominant share of the total number of European patent applications in 2008, amounting to 25.5% (2007: 25.3%) and 15.7% (16.3%) respectively, whilst South Korea accounted for 3% (3.5%).

US companies filed 37 359 European patent applications (2007: 35 590, +4.6%), Japanese companies 23 081 (22 890; +0.4%) and South Korean companies 4 346 applications (4 930, -13.4%). With a total of 1 510 European filings (2007: 1 145, +31.8%), China again increased its number of European applications and now ranks among the five most active non-European applicant countries. 

Filings by technical fields

Filing activity was particularly strong in the fields of medical technology (17 000 applications; 11.6% of the total), electrical communications (14 850; 10.1%) and computing (9 520; 6.5%). The strongest growth rates were noted in the fields of measuring and testing (8 200; +8.9% compared with 2007), electrical elements such as semiconductors and other electric devices (8 900) and general engineering elements (3 870; +8.8% each). This contrasts with the fewer applications in biotechnology and genetic engineering (3 950; -0.9%) and a slower growth in organic chemistry (8 020; +1.4%).

Filings by industrial sectors

Applications from the EPO member states grew particularly strongly  in the area of electronics (semiconductors, optoelectronics, electronic devices; 12 800 applications; +11%), but remained slightly below the level of 2007 in the ICT sector (9 250; -0.9%). A moderate growth was noted in biochemistry/pharmaceuticals (10 400; +1.4%) and industrial chemistry/polymers (9 950; +2.2%).

Fore more information please contact:

Rainer Osterwalder
phone: +49-89-23991820
mobile: +49-163-8399527
rosterwalder@epo.org