Editing by David Du
1. Chinese AI startup Cambricon spends 167.4% its revenue on R&D
Cambricon, a leading Chinese AI chip maker, reportedly spent about RMB768.28 million ($119.92 million) on R&D for its core and AI chip-related business in 2020, taking up 167% of its revenue.
Its high investment in R&D yielded a fruitful result for intellectual property (IP). According to its report, the company filed 555 patent applications in 2020, including 538 for invention patents, seven for utility model patents, and 10 for design patents.
It received 245 granted patents last year, including 222 invention patents, 17 utility model patents, and six design patents. Additionally, it was also granted seven software copyrights and two integrated circuit layout designs.
The company has maintained a relatively high R&D spending for years. In 2017, its R&D spending capped at RMB29.86 million ($4.66 million), which was followed by 240.11 million ($37.47 million) in 2018, and 543.04 million ($84.76 million) in 2019. Its ratios of R&D to revenue over the three years were 380.73%, 205.18%, and 122.32%, respectively, which were significant.
Cambricon is a pioneer in its field, engaged in developing and designing the core processor chips for cloud servers, edge computing devices, smart terminals, and AI products.
2. BOE is the No.3 OLED patent filer in the world
Chinese display panel maker BOE is the No. 3 filer of organic light-emitting diodes (OLED) patents in 2020 after South Korean companies Samsung and LG, according to a report by South Korea’s Yonhap News Agency earlier this month.
The report said that BOE filed 1,676 applications, Samsung 2,786 and LG 2,412. Japanese company SEL with 907 came in fourth place.
South Korean, Chinese, and Japanese manufactures led the world’s patent applications for OLED-related compensation and correction technologies, said the report.
A survey covering South Korea, China, Japan, the United States, and Europe by the Korean Intellectual Property Office (KIPO) shows 89% of the OLED-related patent applications for a period from 2011 to 2020 came from Asia.
Of these, South Korea accounts for 43% of the applications, followed by China 26%, Japan 20%, the United States 5%, and Europe 5 %.
In terms of granted patents, China was ranked third with 2,061 granted patents, following South Korea, with 4,044, and Japan, with 3,533.
3. Chinese companies file most essential 5G patent applications
Chinese companies declared the world’s most 5G standard-essential patents (SEPs) at the end of February 2021.
Liu Liehong, Vice Minister of China’s Ministry of Industry and Information Technology (MIIT) said in a recent report, “China is leading global 5G rollout, with nearly 70% of the world’s 5G base stations being built in China. It also has 280 million 5G subscribers and holds more than 38% of the world’s 5G SEP applications.”
Chinese companies also performed well in 5G declared patent families, including all granted patents and pending applications. According to IPLytics statistics, before February 2021, Huawei filed the most applications, more than 15.39%, followed by Qualcomm 11.24%, ZTE 9.81%, Samsung 9.67%, and Nokia 9.01%.
Other Chinese companies OPPO, CATT Datang Mobile, Xiaomi, vivo, MediaTek, and Shanghai Langbo were among the top 20, accounting for 3.47%, 3.44%, 2.77%, 2.23%, 0.70%, and 0.65%, respectively.
