It is unlikely that anyone will be surprised to learn that the Chinese telecommunications company Huawei has recently filed the largest number of international patent applications. In 2018, Huawei filed 5405 patent applications, about twice as many as Mitsubishi Electric and Intel, which came in second and third.
Despite this, experts at the research company Patent Result from Tokyo believe that not all Huawei patents can be considered innovative. A study conducted by the company showed that only 21% of Huawei's patents in 2018 can be classified as "innovative". By comparison, Intel and Qualcomm, in third and fourth place, hold 32% and 44% of "innovation" patents, respectively.
It is also noted that the contribution of North American talented engineers to the registration of high-quality patents is quite high. According to Patent Result, 30 of the top 17 Huawei engineers came from foreign companies, mostly from North America. The researchers note that the engineers that Huawei managed to poach from foreign companies have a positive impact on the development of new technologies.
Another important point noted in the study is Huawei's aggressive policy of buying third-party patents. The report says the telecommunications giant has acquired about 500 patents from foreign companies, with about half of them purchased from US developers. These purchases have a significant impact on Huawei's patent portfolio, as they account for up to 67% of the "high quality" patents filed by the company. The report mentions that during the reporting period, IBM and Yahoo sold 40 and 37 patents to Huawei, respectively.
Recall that in July of this year, US senators introduced a bill prohibiting Huawei from buying or selling US patents. Given that foreign patents are an important part of the company's patent portfolio, this move could be a serious blow to Huawei's technological progress.
Source: 3dnews.ru