Reuters
Samsung COO Jay Y. Lee
Sqoop is an online service that tracks patents and court documents, and the site has published its ranking of companies according to how many patents they were granted and applied for in 2016.
The 2016 ranking has one major difference to the 2015 list (which you can read here): Samsung has taken the top spot from IBM.
In 2016, Samsung was granted 8,551 patents, compared to IBM's 8,062.
IBM, however, is disputing this ranking. A press release published by the company on January 9 claimed that IBM was granted 8,088 patents in 2016. It said that Samsung was granted just 5,518.
The discrepancy in numbers comes from the different methods that IBM and Sqoop used to count patents. IBM used data from patent tracking firm IFI Claims, which doesn't collate patents under one company. Sqoop, however, grouped together all of Samsung's companies into one spot on the list.
Here's the full ranking from Sqoop of patents granted in 2016:
- Samsung - 8,551
- International Business Machines Corporation - 8,062
- LG - 4,102
- Canon Kabushiki Kaisha - 3,673
- Google - 3,210
- Intel - 3,068
- Qualcomm - 3,018
- Sony - 2,653
- Toshiba - 2,536
- Microsoft - 2,389
- Taiwan-Semiconductor Manufacturing Co., Ltd. - 2,268
- Apple Inc. - 2,115
- Panasonic - 1,998
- Amazon.com, Inc. - 1,659
- Seiko Epson Corporation - 1,650
- General Electric Company - 1,642
- Fujitsu Limited - 1,582
- Ford Global Technologies,LLC - 1,503
- Toyota-Jidosha Kabushiki Kaisha - 1,424
- Ricoh Company,Ltd. - 1,414
- GlobalFoundries, Inc. - 1,388
- AT&T - 1,239
- Robert Bosch GmbH - 1,208
- Huawei Technologies Co., Ltd. - 1,206
- SK Hynix Inc. - 1,108
- GM Global Technology Operations LLC. - 1,103
- Hewlett-Packard11 - 1,093
- Semiconductor Energy Laboratory Co., Ltd. - 1,082
- The Boeing Company - 1,049
- Hyundai Motor Company - 1,034
- Mitsubishi Electric Corporation - 1,014
- Koninklijke Philips N.V. - 1,006
- Siemens Aktiengesellschaft - 977
- Cisco Technology, Inc. - 968
- Brother Kogyo Kabushiki Kaisha - 962
- Honda Motor Co., Ltd. - 922
- NEC Corporation - 895
- Texas Instruments Incorporated - 882
- Boe Technology Group Co., Ltd. - 870
- Micron Technology, Inc. - 861
And here's the ranking of companies by patents applied for in 2016:
- Samsung - 10,695
- International Business Machines Corporation - 8,800
- LG - 4,421
- Canon Kabushiki Kaisha - 3,562
- Toshiba - 3,289
- Qualcomm - 3,057
- Intel - 2,900
- Toyota Jidosha Kabushiki Kaisha - 2,683
- Microsoft - 2,638
- Sony - 2,398
- Boe Technology Group Co., Ltd. - 2,263
- Apple Inc. - 2,255
- General Electric Company - 2,118
- Panasonic - 2,086
- Huawei Technologies Co.,Ltd. - 2,033
- Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company, Ltd. - 1,927
- Google - 1,905
- Hyundai Motor Company - 1,836
- Seiko Epson Corporation - 1,824
- Ford Global Technologies, LLC. - 1,727
- United Technologies Corporation - 1,724
- Fujitsu Limited - 1,714
- Hewlett-Packard - 1,316
- Koninklijke Philips N.V. - 1,295
- AT&T - 1,269
- Telefonaktiebolaget L.M. Ericsson (publ) - 1,259
- The Boeing Company - 1,217
- Mitsubishi Electric Corporation - 1,153
- Robert Bosch GmbH - 1,126
- Halliburton Energy Services,Inc. - 1,121
- Fujifilm Corporation - 1,021
- GM Global Technology Operations LLC. - 1,018
- Hon Hai Precision Industry Co., Ltd. - 1,008
- Siemens Aktiengesellschaft - 1,006
- Denso Corporation - 1,004
- Shenzhen China Star Optoelectronics Technology Co., Ltd. - 997
- SK Hynix Inc. - 958
- Semiconductor Energy Laboratory Co.,Ltd. - 934
- Honeywell International Inc. - 930
- Honda Motor Co., Ltd. - 905