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Canon ranks in the top five for number of U.S. patents granted for 35 consecutive years, and the first among Japanese companies for 16 consecutive years.

January 14, 2021

Canon ranked third for the number of patents registered with the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) in 2020 (announced by IFI CLAIMS Patent Services, a U.S. patent research firm, on January 14, 2021^*). This marked the 35th consecutive year that Canon has ranked in the top five, making it the only company in the world to have achieved this record. Canon also ranked first among Japanese companies for the 16th consecutive year. Canon places a high value on acquiring patents not only in Japan, but also overseas, and promotes the acquisition of patent rights based on its business strategies as well as the technology and product trends in each market. * Numbers for 2016-2019 are based on publicly available information from the United States Patent and Trademark Office.

	2020	2019	2018	2017	2016
1	IBM^*1	IBM	IBM	IBM	IBM
2	Samsung Electronics	Samsung Electronics	Samsung Electronics	Samsung Electronics	Samsung Electronics
3	Canon	Canon	Canon	Canon	Canon
4	Microsoft Technology Licensing	Microsoft Technology Licensing	Intel	Intel	Qualcomm
5	Intel	Intel	LG Electronics	LG Electronics	Google
6	LG Electronics	LG Electronics	TSMC	Qualcomm	Intel
7	TSMC^*2	Apple	Microsoft Technology Licensing	Google	LG Electronics
8	Apple	Ford Global Technologies	Qualcomm	Microsoft Technology Licensing	Microsoft Technology Licensing
9	Huawei Technologies	Amazon Technologies	Apple	TSMC	TSMC
10	Qualcomm	Huawei Technologies	Ford Global Technologies	Samsung Display	Sony

*1 IBM is an abbreviation of International Business Machines Corporation.
*2 TSMC is an abbreviation of Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company Limited.

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