The Most Complete Quantum Technology Patent Report Ever
Recently, the European Patent Office (EPO) released the second publication of its patent insight report related to quantum technologies. This time, the report outlines important patent trends in the field of quantum computing and the following sub-segments: physical implementation of quantum computing, quantum error correction/mitigation, quantum computing and artificial intelligence/machine learning.
Overview of core insights.
The number of inventions in quantum computing has grown exponentially over the past decade
Overall, higher growth rate than all technology areas
Higher than the average share of international patent applications, indicating high economic expectations for the technologies involved and multinational commercialization strategies
Dynamic patent trends in the subfields of "physical implementation of quantum computing", "quantum error correction/mitigation" and "quantum computing and artificial intelligence/machine learning", where the number of inventions has also exponentially increased
In the field of quantum computing, about one tenth of European patent applications have several patent applicants, which indicates an active collaboration between them. Patent applicants come from all continents, and they are clearly focused on the same region or continent.
Figure 1 Number of patent inventions in the field of quantum in different years, limited to international patents.
This report discusses possible explanations based on the results of the analysis of the quantum computing field and selected subsectors. First, the EPO summarizes the trends in filings in the field of quantum computing and compares its results with the overall situation in all technology fields; then, the EPO examines the behavior of the main jurisdictions, active applicants and co-applicants filing for patent protection in order to shed light on the cooperation between different applicants and across borders.
The EPO then also examines the situation and the results of its analysis in the following subfields: physical implementations of quantum computing, quantum error correction/mitigation/mitigation, and quantum computing and artificial intelligence/machine learning.
Analysis of Quantum Technology Patent Development
In recent years, the number of patent applications in the field of quantum computing has been developing dynamically.
Figure 2 Number of DOCDB patent families for each earliest publication year in the field of quantum computing
Figure 2 shows the number of inventions in the field of quantum computing, approximated by the earliest publication date of a DOCDB patent family (a DOCDB patent family is a group of patent documents associated with patent applications covering the same technical content): this date was chosen to indicate the moment when the invention was first made available to the public, which can stimulate the research activities of others and influence the business strategies of competitors. Thus, the earliest publication date is of fundamental importance for the technological and economic development of a technological field.
The graph shows the dramatic increase in the number of inventions in the last decade. This growth is even more dramatic: it is much higher than the generally observed growth in the number of inventions in all technology fields (right-hand scale in Figure 2). Figure 2 also shows a slight increase in the number of inventions in the 2000s. This effect may have been triggered by scientific publications on quantum computing technologies, which are considered fundamental in the scientific community, raising economic expectations and leading to patent applications on these technologies. Another possible explanation for this rise involves the field of adiabatic quantum computing, which was considered a promising technology at the time and led to a wave of patent applications during this period. However, this wave would either fade away after a few years or be superimposed by the strong growth in the number of inventions related to quantum computing observed in the last decade.
Figure 2 also considers patent families in which patent applications are filed in a single national jurisdiction and in multiple jurisdictions. For the latter patent families, patent applicants are generally considered to have ascribed greater economic potential to the inventions in question and, from a geographical perspective, tend to seek wider commercialization. Therefore, the EPO has chosen to focus its analysis on this category of patent families: they are often referred to as international patent families. The dynamics described earlier become more apparent when the number of international patent families for quantum computing is plotted as a function of the year of earliest publication. While the number of inventions in all technology areas continues to grow, the growth in quantum computing is much higher than average (Figure 3). Moreover, there is no indication that this development will slow down in the coming years.
Figure 3 Number of inventions in quantum computing in the earliest years of publication, limited to international patent series
A closer look at the international patent families in the field of quantum computing reveals that the distribution of patent family members across all patent offices is not uniform. Instead, Figure 4 shows that patent applicants focus on the following patent application routes: international applications (WO), U.S. applications (US), Japanese applications (JP), European applications (EP) and Chinese applications (CN).
Figure 4 Statistics of published patent authorities' filings in the field of quantum computing by earliest year of publication
European patent applications are a special case. The European Patent Convention (EPC) establishes a single filing procedure for obtaining patent protection in Europe. With just one patent application, an applicant can protect his invention not only in all 39 Contracting States that are parties to the EPC, but also in one extension country and four validation countries.
Figure 5 Percentage of granted EP patents validated and maintained in one EPC member state, extension or validation country. This figure shows the importance of a country as a location for research and production and as a market in the field of quantum computing.
Figure 6 shows the percentage of these patenting routes out of all patenting routes chosen for quantum computing inventions. It illustrates the consistently high percentage of U.S. patent applications over the past several decades, reflecting the importance of the United States in the field of quantum computing: both as a development of technologies in the field and as an important market for those technologies. Also noteworthy is the continued high share of EP applications and the increasing share of CN patent applications.
Figure 6 Application statistics in the field of quantum computing
It can be seen that the share of international patent applications in the field of quantum computing has increased in recent years. More importantly, the share of international patent applications in this field is significantly higher than the average if compared with the share of international patent application routes in all technology fields (see Figure 7). This higher share can be explained by the high economic expectations of patent applicants for the technologies in question and the corresponding transnational commercialization strategies.
Figure 7 Filing statistics for all technology areas
An important indicator of the strategic direction and success of patent filing strategies in the field of quantum computing is the share of licensed IP.
Figure 8 shows the percentage of international patent families in quantum computing with at least one granted patent on a Chinese, European, Japanese, or U.S. jurisdiction, or a PCT application leading to a national or regional phase. The situation in quantum computing generally follows the trend observed in all technology areas, with a slightly higher percentage in earlier years and a slightly lower percentage in more recent years.
Figure 8 Percentage of international patent families in the field of quantum computing with at least one application on CN, EP, JP, US or PCT leading to a granted patent at the national or regional stage.
The most active applicants in the field of quantum computing are companies, corporations, mainly from the US and Japan (see Table 1). Exceptions are a few U.S. universities and a non-profit organization that maintains relationships with U.S. universities. The list of the most active applicants is headed by IBM, followed by Toshiba (including Nuflare Technology), Intel, and Microsoft.
Table 1 Most Active Patent Applicants in Quantum Computing
The picture becomes more nuanced when looking at developments over the last few decades in more detail (see Table 2). During the 2000s, the Canadian-based company D-Wave Systems was very active in the field, with a focus on adiabatic quantum computing. This activity may have generated some momentum in the field as a whole and attracted the interest of other applicants (e.g. from the United States and Japan). During this decade, only the company was among the top 10 most active applicants. By contrast, in the 2010s, two universities: Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) and Harvard University, attracted attention among the most active patent applicants, while the rest were dominated by large companies.
Table 2 Breakdown of the most active applicants in quantum computing for the periods 2000-2009, 2010-2019 and 2020-2021
The share of U.S. universities has been increasing in recent years, while the remainder continues to be dominated by large companies.
A closer look at the international patent families in quantum computing reveals that the majority of patent applications in these families are filed by a single patent applicant. Although international patent families in which more than one patent applicant files patent applications are in the minority (about one-third), these cases are of particular interest because they provide indications of collaboration between different companies or between companies and academic institutions, either in the same country or across national borders.
For this reason, the EPO has carefully examined international patent families that include at least one member of an EP patent family, as reliable information on country of origin/country of residence is available for these cases. Given that reliable information on the applicant's country of residence is primarily available for EP applications, the analysis of co-applicants focused on such applications.
Of the more than 13,000 international patent families in the field of quantum computing, more than 6,000 patent families have at least 1 EP family member. Of these patent families, more than 500 have more than 1 patent applicant. This corresponds to about one tenth of the share. A closer analysis of the country of residence of the applicants in these patent families with joint patent applications shows that patent applicants from all continents clearly tend to file joint patent applications with patent applicants in relatively close geographical proximity, i.e. from the same regional structure or from the same continent. For example, about two-thirds of the patent families with joint patent applications are located in a country that is a party to the European Patent Convention, and their second applicant is also from one of these countries (see Figure 9). About a quarter of the joint patent families in which the applicant is from a European Patent Convention country have a second applicant from North America. These results suggest relatively close cooperation within the same region and weaker cooperation between applicants from different continents. Similar results were obtained from the analysis of the country of origin/country of residence of the inventors mentioned in the joint patent applications (see Figure 10).
Figure 9 Co-applicant model in quantum computing for international patent families with at least one EP patent family member: breakdown on country of residence
Figure 10 Co-inventor model in the field of quantum computing, for international patent families with at least one EP patent family member: breakdown regarding country of residence
Cross-border collaboration can be observed not only at the geographical level, but also between different sectors, where patent applicants can be assigned to companies, universities, etc., depending on their nature. Figure 11 shows the results of the analysis of joint patent applications in terms of country of origin/country of residence, further broken down according to the sectoral assignment of patent applicants located in Europe. It shows that European applicants from one sector tend to cooperate more frequently with other European patent applicants from the same sector. However, there is also cooperation with European patent applicants from other sectors.
Figure 11 Co-applicant model in the field of quantum computing for international patent families with at least one EP patent family member. Further breakdown of country of origin/country of residence based on sectoral allocation of applicants from EPC countries
1) Core subfield: physical implementation of quantum computing
The strong growth in the number of patent families observed in the field of quantum computing over the last decades is also shown in the subfield of physical implementation of quantum computing, which saw a smaller rise in the 2000s and a very significant increase in the last decade. The growth in this subfield is also significantly higher than the trend that can be observed in all technology areas (Figure 12).
Figure 12 Number of inventions related to the physical implementation of quantum computing for each of the earliest published years
Figure 12 (right panel) also shows the share of international patent families related to the physical implementation of quantum computing among all international patent families in the field of quantum computing. Inventions related to physical implementations of quantum computing rose to more than 20% of all inventions in the field as a whole during the aforementioned mini-wave in 2000, dropped to about one-tenth when this wave ended, and then rose steadily to about 20% over the last decade.
An examination of international patent family members in the field of physical implementations of quantum computing shows that, similar to the field of quantum computing as a whole, patent applicants primarily file patent applications through the following filing routes: international applications, U.S. applications, Japanese applications, European applications, and Chinese applications (see Figure 13). Figure 13 reflects the consistently high proportion of U.S. patent applications in the international patent family in this field, which corresponds to the importance of the U.S. as a country of residence for important patent applicants and as a market for physical implementations of quantum computing.
Figure 13 Statistics of applications related to physical implementations of quantum computing
Figure 14 Percentage of international patent families with at least one granted patent on a CN, EP, JP, US or PCT application in the field of physical implementation of quantum computing granted at the national or regional stage
Figure 14 shows the percentage of international patent families in the field of physical implementations of quantum computing where at least one granted patent on a CN, EP, JP, US or PCT application is at the national or regional stage. Similar to the field of quantum computing as a whole, the situation in the field of physical implementations of quantum computing largely follows the trend observed in all technology areas, with a higher percentage in the earlier years. The fragmentation and partial sparseness of the process in the early years can be explained by the rather low number of inventions in the field during that period.
Table 3 Most active applicants related to the physical implementation of quantum computing
Table 4 Breakdown of the most active applicants related to the physical implementation of quantum computing for the periods 2000-2009, 2010-2019 and 2020-2021
The prominence of the U.S. in this area is also reflected in the analysis of the most active patent applicants (Table 3.) IBM tops the list, followed by other U.S. companies. Companies from Canada, Japan, China and Australia are also among the most active patent applicants. A number of U.S. universities, notably MIT and Yale, also play some important roles.
A more detailed analysis of data from different periods shows that U.S. patent applicants have played an increasingly prominent role in recent decades (see Table 4). In 2000, the first upturn, the list of most active patent applicants was topped by companies from Canada, the United States, Japan, and Australia. In the following years, the situation has changed in favor of U.S. applicants.
2) Core subfield: quantum error correction/mitigation techniques
Similar to the physical implementation subfield of quantum computing, and to some extent related to technology, the quantum error correction/mitigation subfield has been very active. There was a slight uptick in the 2000s and a very strong growth in the last decade (Figure 15). The share of inventions in this subfield relative to the overall quantum computing field has largely continued to grow over the period under consideration (Figure 15, right-hand scale).
Figure 15 Number of inventions related to quantum error correction/mitigation per earliest publication year
The list of the most active patent applicants is again headed by IBM, followed by other applicants from the US, Japan, Canada and Korea (see Table 5). A closer look at developments over time reveals that, similar to the physical implementation subfield of quantum computing, U.S.-based companies have played an increasingly prominent role in the most recent year, while the list of most active patent applicants was significantly more diverse in terms of origin during the 2000s, the first upswing period (Table 6).
Table 5 Most active applicants related to quantum error correction/mitigation
Table 6 Breakdown of the most active applicants related to quantum error correction/mitigation for the periods 2000-2009, 2010-2019 and 2020-2021
3) Core subfield: quantum computing and artificial intelligence/machine learning
Quantum parallelism has demonstrated that quantum computing is particularly well suited for implementing artificial intelligence/machine learning (AI/ML) techniques. For example, the equivalence between graphical models (e.g., generative neural networks) and spin-based models (e.g., Ising or Pott models) has long been known and well-documented in statistical physics, and this analogy leads to a deeper and more direct adaptation of QC to AI/ML.
A variety of solutions have been proposed in the scientific and patent literature, although this innovation is at the very edge of the two emerging technologies. Since QC typically involves "hybrid" systems, including both quantum and classical components, these solutions can implement data or AI/ML models (or their training, if applicable) in either the classical or quantum domain. This also applies to quantum optimization in general (e.g., quantum annealing, variational quantum feature solvers (VQEs) or QAOA) and is particularly suitable for solving AI/ML problems.
Figure 16 Quantum AI/ML solutions: Quantum Generative Adversarial Network (QGAN), Quantum Neural Network (QNN), Quantum Reinforcement Learning (QRL), Quantum Approximate Optimization Algorithm (QAOA)
Another solid start for AI/ML techniques is the application on QC-related data, parameters or variables, which is expected to achieve similar success in other areas due to its application-independent nature.
The quantum computing and artificial intelligence/machine learning subsector is distinctly different from the other subsectors examined and from the quantum computing field as a whole. While the initial, minimal uptick in patent filings in this subsector can be observed in the 2000s, the actual dynamic development has only begun in the last decade (Figure 16). Remarkably, the momentum in this sub-sector is even higher than in other sub-sectors or the quantum computing field as a whole. With this well above-average momentum, the share of inventions in this sub-sector compared to the field as a whole is also on the rise and currently stands at about 15%.
Figure 17 Number of inventions related to quantum computing and AI/machine learning per earliest year of publication
As with the other subsectors considered, IBM tops the list of most active patent applicants, followed by those in Japan, the United States, Europe, Canada, and China (Table 7). The diversity of countries of origin of the most active patent applicants in the quantum computing and AI/machine learning subsectors is clearly higher in the last decade compared to the other subsectors examined, where US-based companies have played an increasingly prominent role in recent years (Table 8).
Table 7 Most active applicants related to quantum computing and AI/machine learning
