UC System Leads Patent Race

by Ketaki Sood, Larta Research Economist, with Renee Peters, Larta Editorial Assistant

For the ninth consecutive year, the University of California ranked first in the number of patents received by universities nationwide, according to the Department of Commerce's United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO).

The UC System, composed of ten campuses, competed against such universities as the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and California Institute of Technology, which ranked second and third, respectively, on the USPTO's top ten list. The UC System, by sheer size, will likely continue to outperform all other U.S. universities in years to come.

How do the top universities in the UC system compare to one another, and at what rates are their R&D expenditures growing? In terms of university-based research, UC Berkeley demonstrated tremendous growth, followed by UCLA and UC San Diego. UC Berkeley's R&D expenditure grew by 64% between 1996 and 2000, followed by UCLA (50%), UC Davis (43%), and UC San Diego (40%). In 2000, R&D expenditure by UCLA stood at about $531 million, compared to UC San Diego's expenditure of around $519 million, and UC Berkeley's expenditure of approximately $519 million.

Universities within the UC system have a strong base of foundation-level R&D and are likely to excel in future technological innovation as they continue to create patent-level technologies.

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