Chinese companies and institutions made a breakthrough in research and development (R&D) last year as the number of their invention patent applications exceeded those made by individuals for the first time.

According to the latest statistics released by the State Intellectual Property Office (SIPO), China's domestic service invention patent applications accounted for 50.8 percent of the total.

The encouraging sign indicates a fundamental change in the irrational patent applicant structure that has obstructed the Chinese intellectual property community since the Patent Law became effective 24 years ago.

The central government's efforts have started to pay off as the structure of the country's patent applications becomes more rational, said China Intellectual Property News.

Service inventions, as a rule, are the fruits of the research activities of enterprises, research institutions and other organizations, and non-service inventions are mostly attributed to individuals' innovative efforts.

As service inventions have an edge over non-service inventions in that they attract more human, financial, material and technological resources, as well as information and equipment support, they therefore represent greater quality and a higher level of innovation.

Nonetheless, this has not been the situation in China since the promulgation of Patent Law of the People's Republic of China on April 1, 1985, due to the poor IP awareness of enterprises and institutions, and the insufficient and poor application of the intellectual property system.

This has resulted in the lower proportion of service invention patent applications, a long-standing problem that has perplexed China's intellectual property community.

Statistics also show that 828,328 patent applications were accepted in 2008, a year-on-year increase of 19.4 percent, among which 717,144 were domestic applications and 111,184 were from overseas. Those accounted for 86.6 percent and 13.4 percent of the total with year-on-year rises of 22.3 percent and 3.5 percent, respectively.

This shows that China's intellectual property strategy has kindled a passion for innovation and boosted IP awareness and capabilities in Chinese industries despite the international financial crisis and enormous downward pressure on the domestic economy in the second half of 2008, according to China Intellectual Property News.

In addition, the domestic patent application and authorization structure has been markedly improved. Of the domestic patent applications accepted in 2008, applications for inventions, applied innovation and exterior design rose by 27.1 percent, 24.4 percent and 17.8 percent year-on-year, amounting to 194,579, 223,945 and 298,620 applications and accounting for 27.1 percent, 31.2 percent and 41.6 percent of all domestic applications, respectively.

Of the overseas applications accepted, 95,259 were invention patent applications, accounting for 85.7 percent of the total.

In terms of patent licensing, China granted a total of 411,982 patent licenses in 2008, up 17.1 percent year-on-year. Among them, domestic and overseas patents stood at 352,406 and 59,576, a rise of 16.8 percent and 18.8 percent year-on-year.

(China Daily 02/23/2009 page11)