Patent Prowess

"Tech stocks may still be dropping in markets around the world, but that isn’t because companies are running out of new ideas, to judge from the compilation IEEE Spectrum is publishing here for the third year in a row. Last year inventors and their employers continued to file patent applications at an ever-increasing rate: there were 456 154 applications for U.S. “utility” patents—those for inventions as opposed to design ideas, new organisms, and so on—an increase of 7 percent over 2006."