USPTO Releases Annual List of Top 10 Organizations Receiving Most U.S. Patents

The Department of Commerce’s United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) announced yesterday the 2004 top 10 private sector patent recipients. Listed below are the 10 corporations receiving the most patents for inventions, with the number of patents in 2004 (and 2003).

1. International Business Machines Corporation 439 (3,415)
2. Matsushita Electric Industrial Co., Ltd. 139 (1,774 )
3. Canon Kabushiki Kaisha 127 (1,992)
4. Hewlett-Packard Development Company, L.P. 96 (1,759)
5. Micron Technology, Inc. 85 (1,707)
6. Samsung Electronics Co., Ltd. 84 (1,313)
7. Intel Corporation 70 (1,592)
8. Hitachi, Ltd 63 (1,893)
9. Toshiba Corporation 61 (1,184)
10. Sony Corporation 59 (1,311)