Samsung and LG Come in 2nd and 3rd
The European Patent Office (EPO) announced on April 5 that South Korean companies’ EPO patent applications hit an all-time high of 9,394 last year, up 3.4 percent from a year ago, and Samsung and LG came in second and third with 3,439 and 2,422 applications, respectively.
Samsung increased its figure by 5 percent year on year. With Huawei on top of the list, KT&G, POSCO and SK came in fourth, fifth and sixth with 233, 168 and 138, respectively.
In the semiconductor industry, South Korean companies’ EPO patent applications increased 36.2 percent last year. Their ratio to the industry total increased from 12 percent to 18 percent from 2017 to 2021. Especially, Samsung’s applications in the industry increased 57 percent to account for 13 percent of the total. Intel and TSMC came in second and third with 3 percent or so each. LG recorded the largest number of EPO patent applications in the fields of electronics and energy.
Last year, a total of 188,600 patent applications were made in the EPO. The number decreased 0.7 percent in 2020 but increased 4.5 percent in 2021. Digital communications is the field that made up the biggest portion of South Korean companies’ applications and their EPO patent applications in the sector increased 8.4 percent last year.