Filing trends in Mexico

WIPO's World Intellectual Property Indicators 2017 report, released in December, features a wealth of data about worldwide filing trends. The report also includes a number of interesting details about filing trends in Mexico.

For the first time, more than 3 million patent applications were filed worldwide in a single year, up 8.3% from 2015

One interesting tidbit is that Mexico is one of the first offices out of the gate when it comes to the first office action on patent applications but it is one of the slowest for issuing a final decision. Average pendency time for first office action in Mexico is three months, which was behind only New Zealand's 1.3 months in the selected offices studied.

But Mexico was fifth-placed among countries studied for taking the longest to issue a final decision, behind Brazil, India, Czech Republic and Vietnam.

Patent grants by office and origin, and patents in force, 2016
	Grants by office total	Grants by office resident	Grants by office non-resident	Equivalent grants by origin	In force by office
Mexico	8,652	423	8,229	950	109,238

Mexico IP filings (resident and abroad, including regional) and economy
Year	Patent	Trademark	Industrial design	GDP (constant 2011 US$)
2002	797	42,298	802	1520.09
2003	749	39,790	929	1541.72
2004	895	44,410	1,095	1607.94
2005	927	50,275	1,078	1656.71
2006	1,051	53,793	1,219	1738.62
2007	1,173	65,963	1,130	1794.33
2008	1,237	66,743	1,328	1819.46
2009	1,341	66,496	1,354	1733.94
2010	1,638	79,444	2,157	1822.54
2011	1,924	81,137	2,267	1896.26
2012	2,219	89,464	2,438	1972.45
2013	2,139	90,747	2,196	1999.28
2014	2,187	96,552	2,391	2044.57
2015	2,508	107,927	2,427	2098.33
2016	2,403	115,940	2,142	2146.65

Mexico had among the lowest share of processed applications that were rejected, along with Australia, Indonesia and Norway. "This can be explained in part by the high share of withdrawn/abandoned applications, where applicants decided to withdraw applications before they could be rejected," explained WIPO.

Among large middle-income origins, India (47.5%), Mexico (45.2%), Malaysia (42.5%), South Africa (28.9%) and Brazil (27.3%) have a high proportion of applications abroad as a share of total applications. The bulk of filings abroad from these origins were destined for the USPTO.

US applicants accounted for 51.3% of all non-resident applications filed in Mexico, a result of technological specialisation, proximity and market size influence cross-border applications. Only Norway (72.4%), Turkey (57.4%) and Canada (52.8%) had a larger percentage.

The WIPO report included data on the rate of women's participation in resident patent applications at national/regional offices, using a name-recognition technology developed by WIPO. Mexico had high rate of 36.4% of resident patent applications containing at least one woman, up from 22.7% in 2005.

Only the Russian Federation (38.7%) had a higher percentage. It was followed by the US (27.5%), Spain (24.6%) and Brazil (24.5%).

Commenting on the countries with the highest rate of women's participation on patent applciations, WIPO said: "These countries have a high share of total filings relating to life sciences such as biology, which show higher rates of woman participation than other branches of science and technology."