Seven universities, led by the University of California system, were among the 300 organizations awarded the most United States patents in 2009, according to a compilation by the Intellectual Property Owners Association. The 10-campus UC system ranked 83rd on the list, with 251 patents. It was followed by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (ranked 153rd, with 134 patents), the Wisconsin Alumni Research Foundation, which manages patents for the University of Wisconsin at Madison (173rd, with 115 patents), Stanford University (178th, with 110 patents), the University of Texas (191st, with 98 patents), the California Institute of Technology (198th, with 93 patents), and the University of Illinois (266th, with 65 patents). The U.S. Patent and Trademark Office ceased compiling rankings three years ago to avoid the perception that it was endorsing the theory that more patents were better, but the association said such a list is at least one objective measure of the patent system.
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6 Responses to 7 U.S. Universities Were Among Top Patent Winners in 2009
wmpche - May 25, 2010 at 5:07 pm
Jim,Can you place us in context vis-a-vis this list? Even if it hurts?Bill
princeton67 - May 25, 2010 at 8:02 pm
“one objective measure: : of what??UCal System has “more than 170000 faculty and staff”: 251 patents”There are 1009 faculty members, or professors, at MIT”: 134.IBM (#1)has 399,409 employees. 4914 patents in 2009patents per employee/professor:IBM: 81 employees per patent. UCal System: 677 employees per patent. MIT: 7.5 employees per patent.
ucprof - May 26, 2010 at 3:23 am
MIT has really streamlined the patent process compared to the Univ of CA where it is unwieldly. Many UC faculty just do not bother because it is a pain and the IP office is overworked or does not take things seriously. Whereas my collaborators at MIT speak of the process there like it was butter. Also you can not count employees in the two systems equally – e.g. the UC system includes a bunch of hospitals where they staff lots of people caring for patients (nurses, technicians etc) that MIT does not have. Ditto for law schools, the vet school at Davis, etc. The UC system is a complicated conglomerate compared to MIT. Even the number of undergraduates differs by orders of magnitude and many of them are also employees.
22286593 - May 26, 2010 at 3:01 pm
princeton67–Are you absolutely insane? You think UC has 170,000 faculty and staff? What planet do you live on? Do you think UC System has 1 million student? The system as a whole has about 9,000 faculty. I suppose that Princeton education of yours left out common sense.
enadler - June 3, 2010 at 12:18 pm
From the UC system Website:”The more than 121,000 UC faculty and staff work together to maintain the University of California’s reputation as the world’s preeminent public research university system.”That page was updated on 22 April 2007–three years ago.
22286593 - June 3, 2010 at 3:09 pm
Last time I checked, gardeners, cafeteria workers, and janitors do not contribute directly to the patent generating activities. The figure you cite is for UC’s to make a case about the economic contribution it makes to the state through hiring. For your info, all U.S. universities grant about 43,000 Ph.D.s in all fields–to imply that UC’s employee 170,000 faculty and staff who have direct role in obtaining patents is crazy–and to make the comparison of 7.5 MIT “employees” (all of them faculty) with 677 UC “employees” (the most expansive definition possible) is simply nuts. Please tell me that you get it, because if you still do not, then you, sir, shouldn’t be reading the Chronicle.