UM ranks 2nd among French universities in the latest INPI rankings
The University of Montpellier is the 2nd French university in the latest ranking of public/private patent filers published by the Institut National de la Propriété Intellectuelle (INPI). It ranked 35th with 38 filings in 2017.
UM beats Bordeaux and the Sorbonne
Every year since 2004, the Observatoire de la propriété intellectuelle has compiled a list of the top patent filers at INPI, based on the number of published patent applications. As the results relate to 2017, the applications taken into account are those filed between July 1, 2015 and June 30, 2016 (it takes 18 months between the filing of a patent application and its publication).
With 38 patent filings published in 2017, UM is the 2nd largest French university in the ranking after Université Claude Bernard Lyon 1. Positioned in 35th place (it was in 74th place in 2016), it is ahead of Université de Bordeaux (42nd place) and Sorbonne Université (45th place).
Unsurprisingly, the top 50 patent filers include the main French industrial groups that invest in research, as well as thirteen research organizations and nine foreign companies. The Valeo Group remains in first place with 1,110 published patent applications (994 applications published in 2016). The PSA Group is in second place, rising from 930 published applications in 2016 to 1,021 published applications in 2017. In third place is Safran, with 795 published applications (758 published applications in 2016). Commissariat à l'énergie atomique et aux énergies alternatives retains fourth place with the same number of published applications as in 2016: 684 published applications.
SATT plays a key role in the development of UM projects
A key partner of the UM, the regional technology transfer accelerator (SATT Ax-Lr) plays a key role in the school's success in this ranking. It is the SATT, in fact, that detects promising technologies among those proposed by the UM, finances them and accompanies them through to the filing of patent applications with the INPI.
"This result is the fruit of a synergy between the excellence of UM's research and the added value of SATT AxLR in terms of technology protection and maturation," explains François Pierrot, the University's Vice President for Technology Transfer and Industrial Partnerships.
"Given that SATT takes an average of 18 months to mature a project, and that the publication of a patent also takes 18 months from the time it is filed, we can consider that we are now reaping the rewards of the work carried out with SATT over the last few years", concludes the vice-president.