Huawei holds the sixth Innovation and Intellectual Property Forum

Huawei held its sixth Innovation and Intellectual Property (IP) Forum on Nov. 11, where the company announced the winners of its biannual “Top Ten Inventions” award. The event gathered experts in innovation and intellectual property from around the world to explore the importance of openness and IP protection in driving innovation and social progress.

“Open innovation drives society and technology forward, and it’s in our DNA. We are committed to an open approach to innovation,” Chief Legal Officer Liuping Song said. “Huawei respects the IP of others, and protects our own, including patents, trademarks, copyrights, and trade secrets.”

In 2024, Huawei’s patent licensing revenue was approximately US$630 million. The patent royalties that Huawei has paid over the years are nearly three times the amount of royalties it has received.

Marco Alemán, assistant director-general of the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO), noted that “Huawei is a leading global user of WIPO’s Global IP Services and a strong driver of innovation. Huawei had 6,600 published Patent Cooperation Treaty (PCT) applications in 2024, and has been the top user of the PCT system since 2014.”

At the forum, Huawei unveiled the innovations that won its sixth Top Ten Inventions award, spanning a range of business domains that are key to future development, including computing, the HarmonyOS operating system, and storage.

Alan Fan, vice-president and head of the Intellectual Property Rights Department at Huawei, emphasized that, as a leading contributor to technology in the ICT sector, Huawei shares its technologies through open-source software, open hardware, patent filings, standard contributions, and academic papers.

As part of its efforts to drive open innovation, Huawei launched the Chaspark Patent site in June 2024. It’s a free and robust platform for researchers around the world to search for patent information, a service that can be prohibitively expensive for students, individual researchers, and small organizations in tech. Today the company announced major updates to Chaspark Patent, including new features such as semantic search and AI summary.

Other guest speakers at the forum include Yali Zhu, general manager of PatSnap China; Qi Wang, Asia-Pacific director of Clarivate; Mattia Fogliacco, president of Sisvel; and Laurie Fitzgerald, president of Avanci Vehicle. They shared their own experience and best practices in open innovation.

Mr. Song concluded by stating, “We are committed to building an environment that protects innovation and IP, and work closely with industry partners to promote constructive IP protection. This way, the industry can continue to grow and develop together.”