Olympian Patent ChampionsJune 30, 2016

The final judges scores are in, and the champions have been named for most utility patents received in 2015.  IBM took home the gold medal with 7440 utility patents issued for the year. This software company, based in New York, has led the patent grant field for 23 consecutive years.

The silver medal in 2015 went to Samsung Electronics (5059 issued utility patents), and the bronze medal went to Canon (4239 granted utility patents).

The US Patent Office awarded a total of 298,407 utility patents in 2015.   In comparison, in 2005 the Patent Office granted 143,806 utility patents. So the volume has more than doubled in 10 years. In 1995, there were only 4 companies who received more than 1000 utility patents. Last year, 35 companies received more than 1000 patents. 

In the competition among educational institutions, the University of California won the gold medal with 489 patents, followed by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology at 278, and Stanford at 205.