Taiwan’s IP rights statistics for the first half of 2020

The Taiwan Intellectual Property Office (TIPO) regularly publishes statistics on applications for IP rights matters and compares them with those of the previous year. As Taiwan has no copyright registration system, the statistics comprise patent applications and trademark applications only. On 28 July 2020 it published the figures for IP rights matters for the first half of this year.

Overview

In the first half of 2020, TIPO received a total of 33,954 applications for invention, utility model and design patents, which represents a 4% decline compared to the same period in 2019. However, trademark registration applications totalled 43,385 – a new record. Both the number of invention patent applications and trademark registration applications filed by domestic applicants show positive growth. TSMC and Qualcomm top the rankings for domestic applicants and foreign applicants filing invention patent applications, respectively.

Patent applications in the first half of 2020

There was a 14% rise in the number of invention patent applications submitted by Taiwan’s small and medium-sized entities (SMEs), thereby maintaining a high growth rate of more than 10% for two consecutive years.

There was a 19% increase in the number of invention patent applications filed by Taiwanese universities and colleges – public universities and colleges contributed 60% of the total invention patent applications and private ones made up 40%. National Cheng Kung University headed the list, with 56 invention patent applications. Among private universities, Kun Shan University outranked others by filing 36 applications.

There was a 2% increase in the number of invention patent applications filed by Taiwanese research institutions, with the Industrial Technology Research Institute at the helm. It filed a total of 98 invention patent applications.

Further, Japan was the top foreign filer for invention patent applications in Taiwan with the largest number of applications (6,105). In a breakdown of foreign applicants, US company Qualcomm ranked first by filing 304 applications, which accounts for a 14% increase over the same period of 2019. 

Japan was also the top foreign filing country of design patent applications with 497 applications. In a breakdown by foreign applicants, Ford topped the list by filing 114 applications. 

Trademark applications in the first half of 2020

There were 43,385 applications filed for trademark registration, which was a 3% increase from the same period last year. Trademark applications filed by domestic applicants numbered 32,843 – an increase of 10%. Although there was a fall in the number of applications filed by foreign applicants, at 10,542, the number of trademark applications filed by domestic applicants set a new record for the most filed since 1989.

The highest number of applications were filed by domestic applicants in Class 35 (advertisement and business management, among other things), with the number of domestic applications reaching 5,955. Among all trademark applications filed by domestic applicants, Uni-President Enterprises Corp ranked first with 228 applications.

The highest number of applications were filed by foreign applicants in Class 9 (computers and technology products, among other things), hitting 2,100.

China was the top foreign filing country for trademark applications in Taiwan with 2,289 applications. In a breakdown by foreign applicants, Huawei topped the list, filing 95 applications.