UN Agency: China Leading AI Patents Race
2024-07-08
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1Recent United Nations data shows that China is ahead of other countries in filing patents for generative artificial intelligence (or GenAI) inventions.
2China has filed six times more patents than the United States.
3Generative AI produces text, images, computer code and even music from existing information.
4Generative AI is growing quickly with more than 50,000 patent applications filed in the past ten years, the World Intellectual Property Organization (or WIPO) says.
5WIPO is a UN agency that oversees a system for countries to share recognition of patents.
6Around 25 percent of the patent applications were filed in 2023 alone, WIPO said.
7"This is an area that is growing at increasing speed. And it's somewhere that we expect to grow even more," WIPO's Christopher Harrison told reporters recently.
8China filed more than 38,000 GenAI inventions between 2014-2023.
9In comparison, the United States filed 6,276 over the same period, WIPO said.
10Harrison said the Chinese patent applications covered several areas from autonomous driving to publishing to document management.
11South Korea, Japan and India placed third, fourth and fifth respectively, with India growing at the fastest rate, the data showed.
12Among the top applicants were China's ByteDance - which owns the video application TikTok - Chinese e-commerce company Alibaba Group, and Microsoft, a backer of OpenAI which created ChatGPT.
13WIPO's Harrison said while chatbots with the ability to copy human communication are already being widely used to improve customer service, GenAI could change industries like science, publishing, transportation or security.
14For example, Harrison said data suggests GenAI-created molecules might help speed up drug development.
15WIPO said it expects even more patents to be filed soon.
16And the agency plans to release a future update of the data, possibly using generative AI.
17I'm John Russell.
1Recent United Nations data shows that China is ahead of other countries in filing patents for generative artificial intelligence (or GenAI) inventions. 2China has filed six times more patents than the United States. 3Generative AI produces text, images, computer code and even music from existing information. Generative AI is growing quickly with more than 50,000 patent applications filed in the past ten years, the World Intellectual Property Organization (or WIPO) says. 4WIPO is a UN agency that oversees a system for countries to share recognition of patents. Around 25 percent of the patent applications were filed in 2023 alone, WIPO said. 5"This is an area that is growing at increasing speed. And it's somewhere that we expect to grow even more," WIPO's Christopher Harrison told reporters recently. 6China filed more than 38,000 GenAI inventions between 2014-2023. In comparison, the United States filed 6,276 over the same period, WIPO said. 7Harrison said the Chinese patent applications covered several areas from autonomous driving to publishing to document management. 8South Korea, Japan and India placed third, fourth and fifth respectively, with India growing at the fastest rate, the data showed. 9Among the top applicants were China's ByteDance - which owns the video application TikTok - Chinese e-commerce company Alibaba Group, and Microsoft, a backer of OpenAI which created ChatGPT. 10WIPO's Harrison said while chatbots with the ability to copy human communication are already being widely used to improve customer service, GenAI could change industries like science, publishing, transportation or security. For example, Harrison said data suggests GenAI-created molecules might help speed up drug development. 11WIPO said it expects even more patents to be filed soon. And the agency plans to release a future update of the data, possibly using generative AI. 12I'm John Russell. 13Emma Farge reported on this story for Reuters. John Russell adapted it for VOA Learning English. 14_________________________________________ 15Words in This Story 16patent -- n. a document that gives a person or company the right to be the only one that makes or sells a product for an amount of time 17generative -- adj. describes using artificial intelligence algorithms to create complete units of content 18application - n. a formal, written request for something 19autonomous - adj. acting separately from other people or things 20chatbot -- n. a program designed to chat with human beings