A new national plan outlines ambitious targets for China's intellectual property (IP) sector by 2030, aiming to boost the country's global competitiveness. The plan calls for more than 22 high-value invention patents per 10,000 people, with IP-intensive industries contributing over 14.6% to the GDP, and public satisfaction with IP protection rising to 83.9 points.
This comprehensive five-year plan, recently published, addresses both current needs and future strategies. It sets key tasks for China's IP development from 2025 to 2030, including special projects for protecting IP in strategic emerging industries and supporting small and medium-sized enterprises through IP initiatives. The plan covers the entire IP chain—creation, protection, utilization, management, services, and international cooperation—reflecting a forward-looking approach.
Such five-year plans have been crucial for China's rapid IP growth. In 2016, the "13th Five-Year Plan" for IP was first issued as a national-level special plan. This was followed by the "14th Five-Year Plan" in 2021, which led to significant improvements in IP quality, protection, and commercialization, marking steady progress toward building a strong IP nation.
For instance, addressing the past issue of numerous but weak patents, the "14th Five-Year Plan" introduced the "high-value invention patents per 10,000 people" metric for the first time, targeting 12. By the plan's end, this figure reached 16, exceeding the goal, with high-value patents accounting for 43.1% of all valid invention patents—a 2.9 percentage point increase from the "13th Five-Year Plan" period. This shift from quantity to quality has spurred a wave of more technologically advanced and marketable patents, supporting industries like AI and biomedicine.
Looking ahead, the "15th Five-Year Plan" sets the bar higher, aiming for over 22 high-value patents per 10,000 people, a jump of more than six from the previous target. This underscores China's determination to enhance innovation capacity and efficiency.
Regarding patent commercialization, the plan tackles the historical imbalance between protection and utilization. The "13th Five-Year Plan" included metrics like patents per billion yuan of revenue in manufacturing. The "14th Five-Year Plan" promoted collaborative innovation among companies, universities, and research institutions. The new "15th Five-Year Plan" introduces measures such as pre-patent filing evaluations for universities and research institutions focused on commercialization potential, along with dynamic patent management. These steps aim to move more scientific achievements from the lab to the market, transforming them into real productive forces.
The consistent implementation of these five-year plans ensures China's IP sector progresses on the right track, maintaining a high-quality development trajectory. The "15th Five-Year Plan" period is critical for laying the groundwork for socialist modernization and accelerating the construction of a world-class IP system. As the second plan supporting the "Outline for Building an Intellectual Property Powerhouse (2021-2035)," it bridges past successes and future goals. The approach is to maintain long-term strategic focus while executing short-term plans, ensuring decisive progress in building a strong IP nation.