IBM with a Record Number of Patents

IBM has announced that it achieved a record number of patents – 6,478 – in the past year of 2012.

These patents are for innovations that will enable fundamental advancements in a wide range of important technological areas today, starting from analytics, big data processing, cybersecurity, cloud computing, mobile technologies, social networking, software-defined environments, as well as in industrial solutions for retail, banking, healthcare, and transportation. These patented innovations will also lead to significant progress in computing known as the era of cognitive systems, according to Siemens.

This marks the twentieth consecutive year that IBM has held the top position on the annual list of patent recipients from the U.S. Patent Office.

-We are proud of this exceptional achievement in technological and scientific creativity, resulting from IBM’s century-long commitment to research and development- stated Ginni Rometty, Chairman and CEO of IBM.

-Specifically, our record in the number of patents in 2012 and two full decades of leadership in this area are proof of the work of thousands of brilliant IBM innovators – living embodiments of our commitment to innovations that are important to our clients, our company, and the entire world-

The record number of IBM patents in 2012 is an achievement realized through the work of eight thousand IBM innovators from 46 U.S. states and 35 countries worldwide. IBM innovators living outside the United States contributed nearly 30 percent of the patents in the total number of patents the company achieved last year.
From 1993 to 2012, IBM innovators received a total of 67,000 patents from the U.S. Patent Office. This number exceeds the total number of all patents received by companies such as Accenture, Amazon, Apple, EMC, HP, Intel, Oracle/SUN, and Symantec.

The list of the top ten companies by the number of patents granted by the U.S. Patent Office in 2012:

1 IBM 6,478
2 Samsung 5,081
3 Canon 3,174
4 Sony 3,032
5 Panasonic 2,769
6 Microsoft 2,613
7 Toshiba 2,446
8 Hon Hai 2,013
9 General Electric 1,652
10 LG Electronics 1,624