The country last year ranked fourth worldwide in the number of international patent applications filed under the Patent Cooperation Treaty for the fifth consecutive year, showing a 7.1% increase from 2023. Shown is the headquarters of the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) in Geneva, Switzerland. (WIPO's official Flickr account)

By Jeon Misun 
Video = WIPO's official YouTube account

For the fifth consecutive year, the country ranks fourth in the number of international patent applications under the Patent Cooperation Treaty (PCT), with the figure rising 7.1%.

The Korean Intellectual Property Office (KIPO) on March 17 said Korea filed 23,851 applications last year to rank behind the top three China, the U.S. and Japan in that order.

Among the top five, the U.S. (minus 2.8%), Japan (minus 1.2%) and Germany (minus 1.3%) saw negative performance in the category, while Korea showed strong growth.

By company, Samsung Electronics ranked second with 4,640 PCT applications and LG Electronics fourth with 2,083. The former's increase of 18.2% was the highest among those in the top 10.

The nation also had four universities ranked in the top 20: Seoul National (fifth), Hanyang (15th), Korea (18th) and Yonsei (20th).

Last year, the world's number of PCT applications inched up 0.5% to 273,900. That of international trademark applications filed under the World Intellectual Property Organization's (WIPO) Madrid System rose 1.2% and that of industrial design applications under WIPO's Hague System jumped 10.3%.

In cooperation with WIPO, KIPO supports the protection of intellectual property rights and provides legal counseling for companies expanding overseas.

msjeon22@korea.kr