Foreign patent applications in China refer to patent applications submitted by applicants outside China to the China National Intellectual Property Administration (CNIPA). With the deepening of global economic integration, an increasing number of enterprises have begun to engage in overseas patent布局 (layout), making transnational patent application activities increasingly prevalent. In 2011, China surpassed both the United States and Japan for the first time to become the country receiving the largest number of foreign patent applications worldwide. Generally, applying for patents in other countries incurs significant costs; thus, technologies protected by patents filed by foreign enterprises in China are typically of considerable importance.

  The Foreign Patent Applications and Citation Data in China launched by CnOpenData is structurally divided into four categories based on patent types: Inventive Patent Publications, Inventive Patent Grants, Utility Models, and Designs. Each category includes a Basic Information Table, Citation Table, Cited-by Table, and Transaction Table (Designs only have a Basic Information Table). This framework aims to present the status of foreign patent applications and grants in China, providing academia with high-quality and advanced data support for research on foreign patents in China.

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Time Coverage

• Inventive Patent Publications: 1985-2023 (by application publication date)
• Inventive Patent Grants/Utility Models/Designs: 1985-2023 (by grant/announcement date)

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Data Scale

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Field Descriptions

Foreign Inventive Patent Publications in China

Foreign Inventive Patent Grants in China

Foreign Utility Model Patents in China

Foreign Design Patents in China

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Sample Data

Due to the large number of tables, this page only displays sample data for Inventive Patent Publications. For other categories, please refer to the respective branch pages on the left.

Basic Information Table for Foreign Inventive Patent Publications

Citation Table for Foreign Inventive Patent Publications

Cited-by Table for Foreign Inventive Patent Publications

Transaction Table for Foreign Inventive Patent Publications

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References

• Qu Ruxiao and Li Xue, 2023, "Foreign Patents and Import Competition: Evidence from Chinese Enterprises," China Industrial Economics 3.
• Qu Ruxiao and Liu Xia, 2019, "Research on the Technology Spillover Effects of Foreign Patent Applications in China," The Journal of World Economy 11.

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Data Update Frequency

Annual updates