Samsung Electronics filed the largest number of patents for medical devices in Korea over the past decade, government data showed.
According to a report released by the Korean Intellectual Property Office (KIPO), the number of patent applications in the field of medical equipment increased by an annual average of 6.82 percent over the past 10 years, to a total of 76,949.
The growth rate is five times higher than that of total patents registered at the KIPO (1.3 percent) during the period.
Between 2009 and 2018, Samsung Electronics filed 2,164 patents. The company ranked first in a variety of sectors, including medical devices for imaging, biometrics, in vitro diagnostic, rehabilitation and medical information.
It also ranked third in the patents filed for endoscope devices.
Samsung Electronics’ patent registration
If Samsung Medison (817 patents) is included, Samsung affiliates registered a total of 2,981 patents together.
Other institutions or companies that ranked in the top 10 for most medical device patents filed included Yonsei University (798), Seoul National University (755), Korea University (659), Electronic and Telecommunication Research Institute (563), Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology (528), Kimberly-Clark Worldwide Inc. (428), Unicharm (417) and Korea Institute of Science and Technology (409).
Among medium-sized companies, Osstem Implant had the largest number of patents (366), while DO Inc. ranked top among small enterprises (143).
Koreans accounted for 76.8 percent of applicants with foreigners taking up the other 22.9 percent.