IP-related statistics from the recent past

A selection of key IP facts and figures, as reported by IAM and other sources

Figures 1 and 2 show the share of new patent litigation cases filed in selected federal districts before and after the US Supreme Court decision in TC Heartland LLC v Kraft Foods Group Brands LLC. The ruling held that, as applied to domestic corporations, ‘residence’ in the patent venue statute Section 1400(b) refers only to the state of incorporation. After the May 22 2017 decision, the District of Delaware overtook the Eastern District of Texas as the top venue for new suits.

Figure 1. 2017 patent litigation pre-TC Heartland

Figure 2. 2017 patent litigation post-TC Heartland

Table 1. Stock performance of selected publicly traded IP-centric companies, May-July 2017

Source: Google Finance

Tables 2A and 2B show the entities with the highest volume of in-bound patent assignment transactions (assignee table) and out-bound patent assignment transactions (assignor table), as recorded at the US Patent and Trademark Office. These results are calculated by aggregating the number of transactions completed by an assignee/assignor in May and June 2017.

One transaction may include multiple patents, patent families and patent portfolios. Many companies create numerous holding vehicles to house their different IP portfolios; this is why similar company names may appear multiple times in the tables.

Table 2A. Top 30 patent assignees by number of transactions, May-June 2017

#

Assignee entity

Number of assignments transacted

1

National Institutes Of Health - Director DEITR

502

2

National Institutes Of Health (NIH), U.S. Dept. Of Health And Human Services (DHHS), U.S. Government

392

3

Huawei Technologies Co., Ltd.

188

4

Trimble Inc.

151

5

Dow Global Technologies LLC

127

6

LG Electronics Inc.

110

7

National Science Foundation

109

8

Microsoft Technology Licensing, LLC

79

9

Intel Corporation

74

10

Olympus Corporation

71

11

The Regents Of The University Of California

65

12

Siemens Healthcare GmbH

63

13

Sony Corporation

61

14

Nestec S.A.

61

15

Thomson Licensing

58

16

Siemens Aktiengesellschaft

56

17

Abb Schweiz AG

56

18

Optinose AS

53

19

Nalco Company LLC

50

20

Google Inc.

49

21

Youngo Limited

47

22

Microsoft Corporation

44

23

Qualcomm Incorporated

42

24

Koninklijke Philips N.V.

39

25

Hewlett-Packard Development Company, L.P.

39

26

Alibaba Group Holding Limited

39

27

Kabushiki Kaisha Toshiba

38

28

University Of Southern California

37

29

Telefonaktiebolaget LM Ericsson (Publ)

37

30

Samsung Electronics Co., Ltd.

37

Source: ktMINE (www.ktmine.com)

Table 2B. Top 30 patent assignors by number of transactions, May-June 2017

#

Assignor entity

Number of assignments transacted

1

Partners Healthcare Innovation

161

2

University Of Utah

76

3

Washington University

73

4

Landmark Enterprise Inc.

47

5

North Carolina State University Raleigh

44

6

Toyota Motor Engineering & Manufacturing North America, Inc.

40

7

Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory

37

8

Shire-NPS Pharmaceuticals, Inc.

33

9

Siemens Aktiengesellschaft

33

10

University Of Delaware

31

11

Mcghie, Sean I.

30

12

Buchheit, Brian K.

29

13

Siemens Medical Solutions USA, Inc.

25

14

Boston Children's Hospital

23

15

Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center

21

16

PNC Bank, National Association

21

17

University Of Colorado

19

18

Sony Interactive Entertainment Inc.

19

19

Oklahoma Medical Research Foundation

19

20

Wang, King-Yuan

18

21

Desomma, Frank L.

17

22

University Of Maryland, College Park

16

23

Bank Of America, N.A.

16

24

Icahn School Of Medicine At Mount Sinai

15

25

Silicon Valley Bank

15

26

Quarterhill Inc.

15

27

University Of Florida

14

28

HP Printing And Computing Solutions, S.L.U.

14

29

Kabushiki Kaisha Toshiba

14

30

Univ Of North Carolina Chapel Hill

13

Source: ktMINE (www.ktmine.com)

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