In the Global Innovation Index 2025, India ranks 38th globally and 1st among lower-middle-income economies, reinforcing that the patent surge is part of a broader innovation-system upgrade, not an isolated administrative artifact.
The Patents (Amendment) Rules, 2024 (effective 15 March 2024) introduced a cluster of applicant-facing reforms, most notably, tightening timelines for requesting examination, easing certain compliance burdens and adjusting practices that affect prosecution strategy and portfolio structuring.
Against the backdrop of regulatory modernization, expanding innovation participation, and India’s strengthening position in the global IP order, this report presents a comprehensive, evidence-driven analysis of India’s patent filing landscape from 2019 to 2026.
India’s patent trajectory unfolds in three distinct phases: sustained acceleration (2015–2019), structural expansion (2020–2023) and visible moderation thereafter.
The sharp rise between 2020 and 2022 aligns closely with multiple macro drivers: pandemic-induced health innovation, rapid digital adoption and the launch of Production Linked Incentive (PLI) schemes. These incentives catalyzed R&D investments that translated directly into patent filings.
Importantly, India introduced significant procedural amendments in 2024 aimed at improving prosecution efficiency and reducing compliance burdens. The Patents (Amendment) Rules, 2024 streamlined timelines and strengthened procedural clarity, indicating a policy direction toward faster, more predictable patent processing. Such reforms often signal a shift from volume-driven growth to quality-driven consolidation.
What this company ranking reveals is less about who leads in raw patent volume and more about how global technology leaders are embedding India into their broader innovation, manufacturing and commercialization strategy.
Qualcomm’s leadership position aligns directly with India’s accelerated 5G rollout. Since nationwide 5G deployment began in 2022, India has emerged as one of the fastest-growing 5G markets globally, with hundreds of thousands of base stations deployed within two years. For standards-essential patent (SEP) holders, such a market cannot remain unprotected.
Samsung’s second-place ranking reflects more than filing enthusiasm. The company operates one of the world’s largest mobile manufacturing facilities in Noida and maintains extensive R&D operations in Bengaluru and Noida.
India’s patent landscape is telling a clear story: innovation is gravitating toward digital technologies at scale, while life sciences and industrial engineering remain deeply entrenched pillars.
Information Technology (124,897 families) and Data Processing (117,803) together dominate the technology mix. This is not incidental. India’s digital public infrastructure, spanning Aadhaar, UPI, ONDC, DigiLocker and broader API-driven governance architecture, has created one of the world’s most active digital ecosystems. As enterprises build on this infrastructure, patenting activity naturally clusters around cloud systems, AI frameworks, fintech architecture, cybersecurity and distributed data platforms.
India’s patent composition mirrors its economic trajectory: a digitally empowered economy layered over pharmaceutical strength and supported by industrial policy ambition.
India’s patent ecosystem is no longer shaped solely by domestic inventions but is being increasingly influenced by the world’s most advanced research economies.
Why does India attract such significant patent activity from global innovation leaders?
The answer lies in India’s evolving dual identity: a high-growth commercial market and an increasingly strategic R&D base.
Over the past decade, multinational corporations have expanded their Global Capability Centers (GCCs) and R&D units in India at scale. According to NASSCOM, India hosts over 1,700+ GCCs, many engaged in high-end engineering, semiconductor design, AI development and product innovation.
India’s dominance in total families indicates strengthening indigenous innovation capacity. Yet the sustained foreign-origin presence confirms that India has also become embedded in global R&D architecture.
