India-domiciled cos filed over 4,600 patents in US between 2015-2018: Nasscom

India-domiciled companies filed over 4,600 patents in the US between 2015-2018, a majority of which were from the technology domain, a report by industry body Nasscom said Friday.

The report titled 'Emerging Technologies: Leading the Next Wave of IP Creation for India' highlighted how companies in India are creating intellectual property (IP) assets in the US, which is one of the most favoured destinations for filing patents.

Interestingly, Indian start-ups have filed nearly 200 patents in the US during 2015-18, and a majority of these focused on emerging technology areas including image processing, artificial intelligence, cyber security, vehicle technology and Internet of Things (IoT).

Overall, the share of technology patents from India-domiciled companies has consistently increased to 64.8 per cent in 2017-18 from 51 per cent in 2015, the report said.

Within technology patents, the share of emerging technologies has increased consistently to 56.3 per cent in 2017-18 from 38.3 per cent in 2015, while the share of computer and communication technology patents witnessed a decline.

AI led the emerging technologies patent race both in terms of number of patents (330 patents) as well as growth over the period 2015-18.

Apart from AI, there has been a consistent growth on building IP in other emerging tech domains with patents being filed in cyber security (193), IoT (107) and cloud computing (88) accounting for over 50 per cent of the tech patents filed in 2017-18, the report said.

Innovation is the key to driving transformation and such patents and trademarks are a testimony to this transformational growth, Nasscom President Debjani Ghosh said.

"As a country, India can further strengthen its potential as an innovation hub through more investments in research and strategic collaborations. We are confident that we will usher in a new wave of innovation and intelligence in the country," she added.

The study also highlighted the patent growth story in newer application areas including cyber security (96), digital payments (31), e-commerce (87) and navigation (58).