With the announcement of the second Jiangsu Provincial Patent Award on August 26 and the 26th China Patent Award on August 28, Jiangsu has once again demonstrated its formidable innovation strength. In the China Patent Award, Jiangsu saw 81 projects recognized, including four gold medals, five silver medals, and 72 excellence awards, ranking third nationally in both total awards and gold medals. Notably, Jiangsu was the only province to achieve growth in both gold medal count and award proportion. For the Jiangsu Provincial Patent Award, more than 90% of the 79 winning projects have already been commercialized within local enterprises, generating cumulative new sales revenue exceeding RMB 100 billion for businesses across the province. Behind these achievements lies a robust innovation ecosystem driven by strong corporate innovation, deep-rooted competitive industries, and a multi-cluster regional innovation landscape.

Corporate Innovation Powerhouse

The China Patent Award represents the highest honor bestowed by the government in the patent domain. Winning this distinction serves not only as official recognition of technological advancement, market competitiveness, and industry influence but also functions as a vital credential for enterprises seeking to upgrade their brands, expand into domestic and international markets, and deepen collaboration across supply chains. Companies are undeniably the primary engine of innovation. In the 26th China Patent Award, corporate-backed projects accounted for over 75% of Jiangsu's wins, well above the national average of 67%. Among the four gold patents, three originated from enterprises, representing 75% and significantly surpassing the national corporate gold rate of 53%. Zhongtian Technology secured five awards, including one gold, through its core technologies in submarine cables, specialty wires, and fiber-optic communications. JCET Group, SINOMA Science & Technology, and King Long Motor each captured two awards, while Hengrui Pharmaceuticals claimed a gold patent for the second consecutive session, underscoring the long-term vision of leading companies committed to technological excellence and market leadership. Enterprises also spearhead high-value patent creation, with corporate patent holders representing 78.5% of all winners in the second Jiangsu Provincial Patent Award. Many Jiangsu firms are tackling industry pain points head-on, leveraging sustained R&D efforts and strategic high-value patent portfolios to sharpen their competitive edge. For instance, Xinjing Medical (Suzhou) Co., Ltd. won a gold award for its independently developed "magnetic levitation motor and maglev blood pump" technology. Building on this breakthrough, the company's flagship product—the extracorporeal fully maglev artificial heart—was officially approved for market release in April 2024, making it the world's second and China's first approved device of its kind. To date, the product has been adopted by over 50 top-tier hospitals, benefiting hundreds of critically ill heart failure patients, with 2025 sales reaching tens of millions of RMB and continuing to grow rapidly.

Industrial Riches Bear Patent Fruits

Patents are judged not only on technical novelty but also on their alignment with industrial development. In this year's China Patent Award, all four of Jiangsu's gold patents landed in the province's advantageous sectors, demonstrating strong industrial backing. The biomedicine field continues to lead, with Hengrui Pharmaceuticals and Innovent Biologics consistently producing gold-standard innovations. Nanjing University of Science and Technology's declassified "novel chain-type ammunition delivery device" defense patent took home a gold award, marking a landmark achievement in the market-oriented transformation of military patents nationwide. Meanwhile, Zhongtian Technology's flexible DC submarine cable patent earned the sector's first-ever national gold patent, cementing Jiangsu's leading position in high-end equipment manufacturing. Wu Yaping, government affairs deputy manager at Innovent Biologics (Suzhou) Co., Ltd., highlighted that the gold-winning "anti-PCSK9 antibody and its uses" patent has helped break the long-standing import monopoly in this target area, with related drugs benefiting over one million hyperlipidemia patients since their market debut. The Jiangsu Provincial Patent Award reflects a similar trend. All 79 award-winning projects and 10 inventor-related patents span smart manufacturing, advanced materials, biomedicine, and other key advanced manufacturing clusters that Jiangsu prioritizes. Focusing on nano-film innovation, Jiangsu FAVOTEC Nanotechnology Co., Ltd. developed a "nano-coating protection method for electronic devices" that precisely controls atomic ratios, structural design, and functional customization, resolving longstanding issues of "single-function, poor stability, and low consistency" in traditional coatings and setting a new benchmark for electronic device protection.

In terms of China Patent Award distribution across Jiangsu, Nanjing and Suzhou each secured 22 projects, covering sectors such as grid technology, university research, biomedicine, integrated circuits, and optoelectronics. Wuxi followed with 11 projects in integrated circuits, semiconductors, and high-end equipment, while Nantong added 10 projects, leveraging Zhongtian Technology to advance offshore engineering equipment. These four cities form the province's first innovation tier. Meanwhile, Changzhou, Xuzhou, Zhenjiang, Lianyungang, Huai'an, Yangzhou, and Yancheng all had projects shortlisted, creating a coordinated innovation framework with southern Jiangsu leading, central Jiangsu accelerating, and northern Jiangsu keeping pace.

Patents Fuel Trillion-Yuan Industrial Growth

The true value of patents is ultimately validated by market adoption. According to the Jiangsu Provincial Intellectual Property Administration, the commercialization of patents from the second Provincial Patent Award has been highly effective: 79.7% of the projects were implemented directly by provincial patent holders, while 20.3% were transferred to enterprises via industry-academia-research collaboration, licensing, or intangible asset equity participation—with over 90% landing in Jiangsu-based companies. As of the end of 2024, these award-winning patents have contributed cumulative new sales revenue exceeding RMB 100 billion for provincial enterprises. Zhongtian Technology Submarine Cable Co., Ltd.'s "flexible DC submarine cable" patent, after winning the Jiangsu Provincial Gold Patent, has now also secured the China Patent Gold Award. Flexible DC submarine cables are critical for offshore wind power and long-distance power transmission, and this patent successfully overcomes "bottleneck" technical challenges in cable manufacturing. Zhang Hongliang, the company's chief engineer, explained that the patented technology has been applied to high-voltage DC submarine cable production, with products passing full-performance and pre-qualification tests by third-party authorities, reaching internationally leading standards. To date, 198 kilometers of ±400kV high-voltage DC cables and 117.5 kilometers of ±500kV DC cables have been successfully delivered, breaking international monopolies and supporting nearly 50 offshore wind or oil and gas submarine power transmission projects worldwide. Patents that underpin national strategies and address public needs are transitioning from laboratories to production lines, unlocking socio-economic value. The gold patents from Nanjing Fiberglass Research & Design Institute and SINOMA Science & Technology achieved a "from 0 to 1" breakthrough in digital process design for "3D woven composite preforms," powerfully supporting the development of domestically produced commercial aero-engine models. Additionally, the gold patent for "anti-PD-L1 antibodies" from CMAB and CTTQ targets malignant tumors such as solid tumors and hematologic cancers. Since the related drug received approval in April 2024, it generated sales of RMB 380 million within just eight months, offering new treatment options for cancer patients nationwide.

Building a Foundation for Technological Innovation

The dazzling array of award winners reflects years of systematic intellectual property development in Jiangsu. The province was among the earliest to explore high-value patent cultivation, having established 135 provincial-level high-value patent cultivation centers that broadly cover its "1650" industrial system. It has also facilitated the inclusion of 129,000 university patents into a national transformation resource database, with annual patent licensing and transfer transactions surpassing 100,000. Intellectual property pledge financing has consistently maintained a scale of RMB 100 billion, benefiting nearly 30,000 enterprises cumulatively. Moving forward, Jiangsu's intellectual property authorities will continue to intensify efforts by deepening industrial patent navigation, focusing on frontier sectors like artificial intelligence and semiconductors for new high-value patent cultivation centers. They will also implement overseas patent strategies to help enterprises upgrade from "product going global" to integrated "patent, technology, and brand going global." Leveraging its provincial digital intelligence innovation center, Jiangsu plans to build a unified "online platform plus offline hub" service system, driving full-chain digital upgrades in IP creation, positioning, protection, and operations. By establishing a tiered, province-city coordinated cultivation mechanism and aligning provincial standards with national patent award criteria, the province aims to guide leading enterprises in clustering patent portfolios around key areas, further elevating Jiangsu's comprehensive IP strength and industrial competitiveness while providing solid support for the development of new quality productive forces and high-quality growth across the province.