8. PATENTS ISSUED EACH YEAR TO THE 15 CORPORATIONS RECEIVING THE LARGEST NUMBERS OF PATENTS For the purpose of supplying additional material which might show any trends in the number of patents received by the larger corporations, a further study was made of the patents issued each year to a small group of the largest patent-obtaining corporations. Table 8 presents the number and proportion of patents issued each year to the 15 corporations which received the largest numbers of patents in that year, for the 20 years 1936 to 1955. The 15 corporations of one year are not entirely the same as the 15 in another year, for each year includes just the particular 15 corporations which received the largest number of patents in that year. From year to year there was a shift of two (8 times), one (8 times), or none (3 times) in the 15 companies which received the most patents. Of the corporations included, 9 were among the top 15 each year of the 20-year period These nine are, in order of their total number of patents: (1) General Electric Co., (2) American Telephone & Telegraph Co., (3) Radio Corporation of America, (4) Westinghouse Electric Corp., (5) E. I du Pont de Nemours & Co., (6) Esso Standard Oil Co., (7) General Motors Corp., (8) Eastman Kodak Co., (9) Bendix Aviation Corp. In addition to these 9, 5 companies appear among the top 15 from 11 to 15 times each. These companies are: American Cyanamid Co. United Shoe Machinery Corp., Shell Oil Co., Phillips Petroleum Co.. and Westinghouse Air Brake Co. In addition, 6 companies appeared among the top 15 from 5 to 8 times each, and 8 companies appeared less than 5 times, including 3 which appear only once.10 TABLE 8.-Patents issued to 15 companies receiving the largest number of patents each year, 1936–55 Column (1) of table 8 gives the total number of patents issued each year to the 15 companies receiving the largest numbers of patents in that year. Column (2) gives the percentage of the patents issued to the top 15 companies relative to the total number of patents issued in 10 These companies were identified by taking the names of the top 20 companies listed in list 1 of the af pendix. the names of the top 20 companies receiving the largest number of patents in 1955. and the top companies receiving the largest number of patents in 1936-38. The result was a list of 30 companies, and the patents issued to each of these companies were counted for each year, extending the count back to 1936 0 to make a 20-year period. Subsidiaries and merged companies were included in the same manner and to the same extent as shown under the names of these companies listed in the appendix. From the tabulati of the number of patents issued to these 30 companies each year, the top 15 for each year were selected and this total is given in the table. The companies included in this tabulation are those which are numbere 1 to 23, and 26, 28, 29, 31, and 41 in the appendix. the given year, and the next column gives the percentage of the patents issued to the top 15 companies relative to the number of patents issued to all corporations in the given year. Referring to column (2), giving the percentage of total patents issued to the top 15 companies, the first 5 years, 1936 to 1940, show an average of 11.72 percent, with very little variation about this average. The last 5 years, 1951 to 1955, show an average of 10.71 percent, a decrease of about one-eleventh from the value of the percentage for the earlier years. However, there is a rise in the percentage to the top 15 corporations from 1940 to 1946 and thereafter a decline to the recent figures. This rise occurs during the same time as the rise in the percentage of patents to all corporations which has been discussed in the preceding section. In the preceding section it was pointed out that during this period the total number of patents issued each year was decreasing and smaller than normal and consequently the increase in the percentage of patents issued to corporations (occurring while the actual number of patents issued to them was decreasing) merely indicated that the causes of the decrease in filings and issuances of patents operated less strongly on corporations than on individuals. The present tabulation of the patents issued to the top 15 corporations indicates that the causes for the decrease in filings and issuances operated still less strongly on the larger corporations. Considering the war period and the years thereafter as abnormal and not included, the trend in the proportion of patents issued each year to the largest patent obtaining companies exhibits a decline, as has been noted. However, considering each year of the 20-year period, a straight line fitted to the data by statistical methods would also show a similar decreasing trend. Referring to column (3), giving the percentage of patents issued to the top 15 companies relative to the number of patents issued to all companies, the first 5 years, 1936 to 1940, show an average of 20.38 percent. The last 5 years, 1951 to 1955, show an average of 18.61 percent. A similar decline would also be shown if all years were considered and the straight-line trend calculated. The rise in the percentage from 1940 to 1947 and the subsequent decline to the recent figures indicates that the causes of the drop in the number of patents ssued during the war operated less strongly on the top corporations han on the others, as has been stated. 9. PATENTS ISSUED TO CORPORATIONS IN 1955 The total number of patents issued to corporations in the year 1955 and the total number of corporations receiving patents in this year vere counted from the annual Index of Patentees for 1955, a new arrangement of the entries making it convenient to do this for that ear. There were 5,316 corporations receiving a total of 17,947 patents (this number includes 119 reissues) in 1955. The proportion of patents issued to corporations in this year, 58.58 percent, is almost he same as the average for the 17 years 1939-55, although the proportion to United States corporations is a little over 1 percent lower han the average to United States corporations for the 17-year period. The year 1955 shows a drop in the proportion of patents issued to the elected group of 176 large corporations, as pointed out in section 5. Table 9 presents a listing of the number of corporations which received only 1 patent in 1955, the number which received 2 patents, and so on, for both United States and foreign corporations. TABLE 9.-Patents issued to corporations, 1955 APPENDIX LISTS OF CORPORATIONS AND NUMBERS OF PATENTS ISSUED TO THEM IN 1939-55 The following lists give the names of corporations and the number of patents issued to each during the 17 years, 1939-55. Following each name are given the names of other companies-subsidiaries, companies which have merged, and prior names of the same company-if any, which received patents which were added to the patents received by the main company to arrive at the total number given. It should be understood that the figure given for any individual company does not necessarily represent the actual number of patents owned by that company at the end of 1955, and that the figures have been compiled only for the purpose of statistical summaries. There are three lists. List I gives the names of 394 corporations which obtained more than 100 patents. This list is believed to be substantially complete. List II is a partial list of corporations which obtained from 75 to 100 patents. These names have been tabulated for the purpose of listing the names of the corporations in the selected group of large corporations referred to in section 5, which are not on the first list, and to preserve the counts for the other companies included. Since the effort was made to find the corporations with more than 100 patents, this latter group would be incomplete. List III continues the names in the selected group of large corporations by tabulating the names of those which received less than 75 patents. The names of the corporations in the selected group of the largest corporations have been identified by the letter "A" placed after their name, in each of the three lists. Corporations not in this group and with assets of over $100 million (and less than $150 million) are identified by the letter "B" placed after their names in each of the lists; the three lists include all such names which were found. Corporations with no patents are not included in the listings. One or two of the names included may not necessarily be corporations. I. CORPORATIONS WITH OVER 100 PATENTS 1. General Electric Co. (A) -- 10, 757 Includes patents issued to Hotpoint, Inc. (131); General 8, 539 2. American Telephone & Telegraph Co. (A) Includes patents issued to Bell Telephone Laboratories, Inc. (5,600); Western Electric Co., Inc. (2,087); Teletype Corp. (451); Electrical Research Products, Inc. (26); Nassau Smelting & Refining Co. (20). 3. Radio Corporation of America (A) – – 7, 894 |