A computer-generated image of an artificial intelligence chatbot. (Yonhap)
DAEJEON, Feb. 21 (Korea Bizwire) — Competition is heating up to dominate super-giant artificial intelligence (AI) technology, which is the foundation of services such as the wildly popular ChatGPT from OpenAI, the patent office said Monday.
The number of patent applications related to super-giant AI pending in five major intellectual property rights areas — South Korea, the U.S., Japan, China and Europe — shot up to 14,848 in 2020 from 530 in 2011, according to the Korea Intellectual Property Office (KIPO).
During the period from 2016 to 2020, the number of such applications marked an annual growth rate of 61.3 percent, higher than the annual growth rate of 44.8 percent for the past 10 years.
The KIPO noted that after the shock of AI Go player AlphaGo in 2016, AI research gained stronger momentum.
By country, the U.S. ranked first with 35.6 percent of patent applications, followed by China at 31 percent, Japan at 11.6 percent and South Korea at 11.3 percent.
By patent applicant, Samsung Electronics was positioned at the top with 1,213 applications, followed by IBM at 928, Google at 824, Microsoft at 731 and Baidu at 572.
Kevin Lee (kevinlee@koreabizwire.com)
