USPTO Released List of Top 10 Patent Receivers

prostoalex writes "So who received the most patents in 2004? Despite the frequent publicity around Microsoft's or Amazon's frivolous patents, these two companies are not even on the list. IBM, Matsushita and Canon received the most patents in 2004, followed by HP, Micron, Samsung, Intel, Hitachi, Toshiba and Sony. IBM alone was granted 3,248 patents last year."

Comments

Re:four digits?

[domenic v1.0]

Anybody who works for IBM knows the thickness of the IP papers they must sign just for working for the company, and if you read the fine print, they basically own everything you can conjure up while being an active employee. With 320,000+ employees, thats a lot of ideas. BUT, most people look over the fact that IBM is one of the, if not THE biggest spender in R&D, and that alone is its biggest investment. For example, the earth simulator came out and stunned the world with its 35-TFlops of supercomuting power. IBM already had 100-TFlops (when its completed, currently its at 70-TFlops) up its sleeve with its Blue Gene supercomputer waiting right around the corner.

It's simple, IBM invests heavily in its R&D and does not jump in on marketable, fast money-making ideas that fade away as quickly as people buy into it. IBM has been innovators, and its shown by being #1 in patents for the last 11 years.

Re:The stories that you don't hear

[Halo1]

And is IBM using it's portfolio to do negatively? Nope.

Yeah, right.

Patents are a necessary evil. Any large company has to file patents to protect itself.

By lobbying as hard as it can to get the broken software patent system as it exists in the US codified in Europe?