“Apple was granted a total of 1,135 patents in 2012, ranking it 21st among companies worldwide, up from 39th a year prior,” AppleInsider reports.
“The inventions granted to Apple in the U.S. were ahead of noteworthy companies such as Texas Instruments, AT&T, Research in Motion and Sharp, according to data published Thursday by IFI Claims,” AppleInsider reports. “The number of patents granted to Apple also represented a 68 percent increase from 2011, according to The New York Times.”
AppleInsider reports, “Apple finished just behind rival Google, which won 1,151 patents in 2012 and took 21st place. And Samsung was in second place among all companies with 5,081 patents, more than four times Apple’s haul.”
Read more in the full article here.
Lies. Apple no longer innovates.
Seriously? Engage the brain before you post.
I assume birdy’s comment is dripping with sarcasm or is one of the greatest techtards of 2012 whose brain has flown the coup.
I wonder just how many will be enforceable? How many will be temporarily invalidated anonymously? How many will Judges think are just too hot to handle and pass the buck. My bet, every last one, the patent system and justice system seems to favor the disrupters not the innovators.
Disruptors / spoilers. Sounds like you are an Ayn Rand fan. I agree with you about the dubiousness of enforcement. Even with really deep pockets, a patent can be invalidated fairly easily by another company (cough cough Samsung cough) or just taken at will and used until the glacial court system slaps them on the wrist after they take huge profits.
It would be nice to know what said granted patents are, as this would tell us the nature of the patents, that is, if they are just statements to cover a possibility or whether the patents have actually been manufactured or incorporated into a product and therefor not just pie in the sky.
With over 5000 patents for Samsung, I am guessing that they are patenting all the shapes that a cell phone can be and patenting any use of electricity they can imagine (if it is found on a iPhone first). We all know the struggle to develop something new and just find ways to pile things together that are trending in the electronics world.
When I was a budding design student, we were taught that in order to apply for a patent, one had to build a prototype, draw the technical chart i.e Exploded diagram of the prototype naming every part and what it does and then provide a brief synopsis of what functions the prototype was capable of achieving and any other functions it could achieve with some modifications, this would include the materials used in the prototype as well as any other material that could be used to create a similar product. Only then would your patent application be granted and you would be given a 20 year monopoly to bring the product to market, i.e mass manufacture and if you succeeded in doing so, would be granted a further 20 year period with a maximum of 50 years before your design was then available to everyone. The initial 20 year period was to ensure that anyone with money who could make your product would need to discuss a license agreement with you so that they wouldn’t just wait a few years in order to get it for free. Take the Lego case as an example.
I wonder if the thousands of patents applied for have achieved the Lego criteria?
Samsung have 5 g and future xg wireless patents. Xg is a super fast experimental compressed wireless with super long range and 100% completely owned by samsung under licence from the australian inventer. Was built for aussie outback originally but when active gave network reliability second only to fibre. But of coarse super expencive to setup in this day and age. Telstra are the only company currently signed up to distribute once or if its ever implemented. That said, if xg was to ever work then one company would control the entire worlds network distribution. Do u believe apple will gain a licence????
Then again. Who knowd. Maybe some other technology will superseed it. Beta vs vhs
Granted patents are the fruit of previous R&D – not an indicator of ongoing activity.
Put this headline up top:
Apple spent more money on lawsuits last year than on R&D. Otherwise, more money was spent on lawyers than on engineers.
Hellofajob Cookie.