35 pct of jobs in the EU rely on IPR-intensive industries

30 September 2013
by eub2 -- last modified 30 September 2013

About 39% of total economic activity in the EU (worth some EUR 4.7 trillion annually) is generated by IPR-intensive industries, and approximately 26% of all employment in the EU (56 million jobs) is provided directly by these industries, while a further 9% of jobs in the EU stems indirectly from IPR-intensive industries - according to a study published today by the European Patent Office (EPO) and the Office for Harmonization in the Internal Market (OHIM).

The study, titled “Intellectual Property Rights intensive industries: contribution to economic performance and employment in Europe” (September 2013), measures the importance of Intellectual Property (IP) rights in the EU economy.

The study focuses on the EU economy and considers IPR-intensive industries as either those that register more Intellectual Property Rights per employee than other industries, or those where the use of IPR is an intrinsic characteristic of the industry's activity. These industries are selected at EU-level, i.e. using EU-wide measures of IPR intensity.

The study also finds that:

• Average remuneration in IPR-intensive industries is more than 40% higher than in other industries;
• Examples of IPR-intensive industries include:
• the manufacture of power-driven hand tools (patents);
• the manufacture of basic pharmaceutical products (trademarks);
• the manufacture of watches and clocks (designs);
• book publishing (copyright); and
• operation of dairies and cheese making (geographical indications).
• Hundreds of industries, as diverse as services activities related to financial services and insurance, advertising agencies, ice cream manufacture, wallpaper manufacture, wine production, electric lighting and domestic appliances, satellite telecommunications, and extraction of oil and gas are also all IPR-intensive, and many make simultaneous use of more than one IP right.

A list of all IPR-intensive industries is included in the Appendix to the report.

This study comes on foot of a broadly similar exercise carried out in 2012 by the US Patent and Trademark Office together with the Economics and Statistics Administration, which reached comparable findings for the US economy as the OHIM/EPO study has done for the EU economy.

The study is available at:

The Office for Harmonization in the Internal Market (OHIM)
and
The European Patent Office