One Classification to Rule Them All?

The USPTO and EPO have agreed to create a new Cooperative Patent Classification (CPC) based on the IPC. You can read the press releases here and here. The new system will be based largely on ECLA, the European version of the IPC, but incorporate the best practices of the U.S. Patent Classification system.

The IPC was created in the 1960s as a common classification system intended to replace the numerous national patent classification systems then in existence. The official treaty creating the IPC system, the Strasbourg Agreement, was signed in 1971. There are now 61 countries party to the agreement. Few national classification systems are still in use. The Canadian Patent Classification system was abandoned in the early 1990s.  

US Patent Counts, 2010

The USPTO issued 244,421 patents and published 333,210 applications in 2010, an all-time high of 577,631 patent documents. The number of patents issued in Q4 dropped to 61,037, a slight decrease from the previous quarter. The number of published applications also declined in Q4 to 81,787.

It has been ten years since the USPTO began publishing utility and plant patent applications. In that time, the USPTO has published about 2.6 million applications.

Table 1. Quarterly Patent Document Counts*
2010 ..... Patents (B) .....PGPubs (A)..... Total (A + B)
Q1 ..... 55,488 ..... 77,520 ..... 133,008
Q2 ..... 64,037 ..... 84,919 ..... 143,069
Q3 ..... 63,859 ..... 88,984 ..... 152,843
Q4 ..... 61,037 ..... 81,787 ..... 142,824

Q1-Q4 ..... 244,421 ..... 333,210 ..... 577,631

*Based on preliminary weekly data from the USPTO website. Totals may change after the fact due to withdrawn patents and published applications.

Table 2. Number Ranges, Jan. 1 through Dec. 31, 2010

Utility patents ..... 7,640,598 - 7,861,316
Reissues ..... RE41,067 - RE42,019
PGPubs ..... 2010/0000001 - 2010/0333245
Designs ..... D607,176 - D629,995
Plants ...... PP20,622 - PP21,603
SIRs ..... H2,234 - H2,250