Gender Gap in Patent Filing Narrows both Internationally and in Hungary

According to World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO), 9% of international patent applications were filed by female inventors in 2000, while this percentage increased to 16.5% by 2020.

In terms of PCT (Patent Cooperation Treaty) patent applications, the five fields with the highest percentage of female inventors are biotechnology (30%), pharmaceuticals (29%), food chemistry (29%), biological substance analysis (26%) and organic chemistry (25%). The research also indicates that 51% of all PCT applications in the academic sector involved female inventors, while only 30% in the business sector.

The relevant Hungarian data shows many similarities with the international data. According to the Hungarian Intellectual Property Office, the proportion of female inventors associated with national applications in the period 2000-2015 was 13.3%. The most popular fields among Hungarian women inventors were microstructure and nanotechnology (31%), biotechnology (29%) and organic chemistry (28%).

While the gender gap in patent filing is narrowing internationally, there is still a lot of room for improvement. While Latin America and the Caribbean have the highest share of female inventors with 19%, North America and Asia are at 17%, followed by Europe at only 14%.

Prepared by: Erika Farkas

For more information, please contact hungary@petosevic.com.

Source: Hungarian Intellectual Property Office website