Canon leads the way in Japan for Patent Applications

When browsing through my patent application search engine I happened upon an overall summary for Japan companies.

It's amazing just how busy Canon is in the patent process.  This year, they have overwelmingly had the largest number of patent applications published.

Some will say that this is counter to industry good manners, and by blocking things up in patents, they stifle competition.  I've seen this argument many times, usually by those who favour companies don't really post alot of patents.

I say hogwash, this helps protect your research and development investments and if they didn't patent it - someone else will.

This of course is only the first step in a long chain.  The patents have to be approved still.

I find it interesting that Ricoh and Panasonic are both quite up there, and there's some notable missing companies in the top 10 such as Sony.