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counting USPTO patent applications

Posted: Mon Jun 17, 2013 6:09 pm
by avival
In a simple count of USPTO patent applications for 2010 using PATSTAT, I’m getting a very different answer than USPTO data provides.

I’m a new user so I’m going to lay out what I did and hope that someone can help me discover my error. I’m using the October 2012 snapshot file but I don’t expect things should have changed too much in the updated file.

1. I created a single file from all three tls201 files.
2. I counted all entries with jointly appln_year=2010, appln_kind= “A “ and appln_auth="US". There are a small number of appln_kind D, but it’s trivial. I would expect appln_kind A would match USPTO’s “Utility Patent Applications” and the design and plant patent applications (appln_kind F and P, respectively?) would match USPTO’s design and plant applications.
3. I am not including international filings through PCT (appln_kind=”W ”) in these counts as it is my understanding that they should only be counted when they reach the national level and should then appear as appln_kind “A” with an internat_appln_id linking back to the PCT application.

I’m counting 285,913 patent applications, much lower than the USPTO count of 490,226 for “Utility Patent Applications” (unfortunately I can't post the link).

My appln_kind=”P “ count is also much higher than USPTO’s Plant Patent Applications (74,804 vs. 992), but this discrepancy isn’t high enough to account for the discrepancy.

I’m getting reasonable counts for PCT applications (i.e. they match those from WIPO) using appln_kind=”W “ but am having similar issues with EPO counts.

Hope someone can help and thanks in advance!