Intellectual Property (IP) in India: A Decade of Progress Part 9

The post below gives statistical information about the number of patent applications filed and granted under various fields of invention, in the past decade.

On the whole, a consistent rise has been seen with respect to the number of patent applications filed. The number of applications filed under the Chemical, Electrical, Mechanical fields show a considerable upsurge, while the number of applications filed in fields like bio-technology and food has plunged.

During the year 2008-2009, a total number of 16,061 patents were granted out of which 2,541 were granted to Indian applicants. The number of patents in force, as on 31st March, 2009, was 30,822 out of which 6,158 patents belonged to Indians. A drop in the number of patents granted was seen the next year, out of a total of 6,168, 1,725 applications belonged to Indians. The total number of patents in force, in the same year, were 37,334, out of which 6,781 patents belonged to Indians.

In 2010-2011, 7,509 patents were granted out of which 1,273 were granted to Indian applicants. In the subsequent year, total number of patents granted decreased to 4,381 out of which 699 were granted to Indian applicants. 39,989 patents were in force as on 31st March 2012, out of which 7,545 patents belonged to Indians.

In the year 2012-2013, out of the 4,126 patents granted, 716 belonged to Indian applicants. The numbers of patents in force as on 31st March, 2013, were 43,920 out of which 8308 patents belonged to Indians. Then, in 2013-2014, total number of patents granted saw a slight hike, 4,227 patents were granted out of which 634 were granted to Indian applicants. 7,464 patents out of 42,632 patents in force were of Indian applicants.

The statistics below give information about the number of patents filed and granted under different fields.

Number of patent applications filed from 2008 to 2014 under various fields of invention

Fields 2008-2009 2009-  2010 2010-  2011 2011-  2012 2012-  2013 2013-  2014
Chemical 5884 6014 6911 1168 6812 6769
Drug 3672 3070 3526 282 2954 2507
Food 340 276 315 21 452 387
Electrical 2319 2376 2719 228 3568 4371
Mechanical 6360 6775 7782 888 10198 11318
Computer/Electronics 7063 7646 9594 584 4424 4410
Bio-technology 1844 1303 1497 309 832 647
General 2946 885 1017 153 1561 652
Others 6384 5942 6039 748 12873 11890

Number of patent applications filed during 2008-2014 under other and new fields of inventions

2008-  2009 2009-  2010 2010-  2011 2011-  2012 2012-  2013 2013-  2014
Bio-Medical 68 70 22 176 183 163
Bio-Chemistry 119 27 10 50 75 72
Bio-Informatics 4 10 570 605 636
Physics 110 122 71 454 411 460
Civil 50 50 46 128 160 196
Textile 41 32 34 139 104 141
Metallurgy/ Material Science 62 34 08 71 85 152
Agriculture Engineering 29 40 20 77 103 112
Polymer Science 41 49 19 114 135 80
Micro-Biology 77 113 105
Agrochemical 113 90
Traditional Knowledge/ Bio/ Chem/Mech 98/58/02= 158 70/115/0= 185 22/364/1= 387

Number of patent applications granted from 2008 to 2014 under different fields of inventions

Fields 2008-  2009 2009-  2010 2010-  2011 2011-  2012 2012-  2013 2013-  2014
Chemical 2376 1420 1899 1168 1289 1111
Drug 1207 530 596 282 344 256
Food 97 72 84 21 37 51
Electrical 1140 404 394 228 188 237
Mechanical 3242 1024 1458 888 749 945
Computer/Electronics 1913 1195 892 584 510 690
Bio-technology 1157 449 165 309 144 220
General 1318 273 350 153 121 112
Others 3611 801 1668 748 744 904

Number of patent applications granted during 2008-2014 under other and new fields of inventions

2008-  2009 2009-  2010 2010-  2011 2011-  2012 2012-  2013 2013-  2014
Bio-Medical 19 1 60
Bio-Chemistry 198 17 06 09 01 03
Bio-Informatics 21 55
Physics 65 18 21 13 7 12
Civil 22 06 12 06 03 05
Textile 26 14 09 09 05 04
Metallurgy/ Material Science 40 52 01 11 11 04
Agriculture Engineering 04 04 01 01 03
Polymer Science 41 11 22 11 12 11
Micro-Biology 07 06
Agrochemical 05 02
Others 1 88 34


Read Dr. Kalyan’s note on The Case of Indian Intellectual Property
Image Source/ Attribution- here, governed by Creative Commons License CC BY 3.0