Intellectual Property Power House
South Korea ranked first in the world last year in terms of the number of patents applied for by locals with respect to the GDP and the number of patents applied for by locals per million population, according to the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO). Specifically, the numbers were 8,601 and 3,091, respectively.
In the former category, China came in second with 5,869 and Japan came in third with 5,264. In the latter, Japan took the second place with 2,053 and Switzerland took the third with 1,018.
Last year, a total of 3,169,000 patents were applied for, including 205,000 in South Korea. The country came in fourth behind China (1,382,000), the United States (607,000) and Japan (318,000).
When it comes to trademark application, China topped the list with 5.74 million and South Korea fell from eighth to 10th in one year with 230,000. As for design application, China ranked first with 630,000, followed by Europe (110,000) and South Korea (67,000).
South Korea ranked fourth and first when it comes to the numbers of local trademark and design applications with respect to the GDP, respectively. The country ranked third and first as for the same numbers per million population.