Pfizer has a total of 113472 patents globally, out of which 46651 have been granted. Of these 113472 patents, more than 39% patents are active. United States of America is where Pfizer has filed the maximum number of patents, followed by Japan and Europe. Parallelly, USA and UK seems to be the main focused R&D center and USA is the origin country of Pfizer.
In 1849, two German immigrants, Charles Pfizer and his relative Charles F. Erhart, founded the company in New York. It is a multinational pharmaceutical and biotechnology corporation. Pfizer develops and produces medicines and vaccines for immunology, oncology, cardiology, endocrinology, and neurology. As of January 2022, Pfizer has a market cap of $304.66 Billion.
The company has numerous blockbuster drugs or treatments that produce yearly revenues of more than $1 billion each. In 2020, the United States contributed 52 percent of the company’s revenue, China and Japan contributed 6% each, and other nations contributed 36%.
Access to Pfizer’s Patent Information
Pfizer joined 20 of the world’s leading biopharmaceutical companies to form the Patent Information Initiative for Medicines (Pat-INFORMED), a public-private partnership between the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO), the International Federation of Pharmaceutical Manufactures (IFPMA), and the World Health Organization (WHO) to make it easier for global drug procurement agencies to access a basic body of patent information and make life-saving treatments available to patients in even less time.
In March 2020, as the scale of the COVID-19 pandemic became apparent, Pfizer partnered with BioNTech to study and develop COVID-19 mRNA vaccine candidates.
In November 2021 Pfizer started a new COVID-19 oral antivirus treatment, known as Paxlovid, which according to a recent study reduces the risk of hospitalisation or death by 89%.
How many patents does Pfizer have?
Pfizer has a total of 113472 patents globally. These patents belong to 27151 unique patent families. Out of 113472 patents, 44271 patents are active.
How many Pfizer patents are Alive/Dead?
Worldwide Patents

Patent Families

How Many Patents did Pfizer File Every Year?

Are you wondering why there is a drop in patent filing for the last two years? It is because a patent application can take up to 18 months to get published. Certainly, it doesn’t suggest a decrease in the patent filing.
Year of Patents Filing or Grant | Pfizer Applications Filed | Pfizer Patents Granted |
2011 | 2664 | 2157 |
2012 | 2564 | 2037 |
2013 | 2742 | 1781 |
2014 | 2292 | 1785 |
2015 | 2402 | 1732 |
2016 | 2333 | 1666 |
2017 | 1731 | 1792 |
2018 | 1572 | 1507 |
2019 | 1551 | 1396 |
2020 | 800 | 1303 |
2021 | 439 | 1372 |
2022 | – | 7 |
How Many Patents did Pfizer File in Different Countries?

Countries in which Pfizer Filed Patents
Country | Patents |
United States Of America | 12881 |
Japan | 7286 |
Europe | 7193 |
Australia | 5865 |
Canada | 5128 |
Mexico | 4865 |
China | 4469 |
Brazil | 3702 |
Korea (South) | 3563 |
India | 3220 |
Germany | 3190 |
Spain | 2702 |
Taiwan | 2564 |
Israel | 2245 |
South Africa | 2059 |
Argentina | 1768 |
Singapore | 1669 |
New Zealand | 1611 |
Norway | 1566 |
Hong Kong (S.A.R.) | 1558 |
Malaysia | 1513 |
Russia | 1367 |
Hungary | 1244 |
Denmark | 1244 |
Peru | 1217 |
Thailand | 1106 |
Austria | 1083 |
Poland | 1017 |
Turkey | 1015 |
Viet Nam | 1000 |
Portugal | 964 |
Eurasian Patent Organization | 894 |
Philippines | 887 |
Czech Republic | 718 |
Slovenia | 666 |
Uruguay | 598 |
Costa Rica | 598 |
Slovakia | 528 |
Colombia | 504 |
Dominican Republic | 503 |
United Kingdom | 496 |
Chile | 492 |
Ecuador | 490 |
Tunisia | 464 |
Ukraine | 461 |
Guatemala | 425 |
African Intellectual Property Organization | 424 |
Morocco | 394 |
Cyprus | 388 |
Panama | 373 |
Croatia | 370 |
African Regional Industrial Property Organization | 367 |
Indonesia | 338 |
Georgia | 319 |
Mongolia | 310 |
Serbia | 309 |
Netherlands | 225 |
Finland | 221 |
Iceland | 205 |
Honduras | 196 |
El Salvador | 186 |
Cuba | 185 |
Bulgaria | 141 |
Nicaragua | 139 |
Lithuania | 115 |
Montenegro | 114 |
Sweden | 113 |
Gulf Cooperation Council | 103 |
Estonia | 103 |
Yugoslavia/Serbia and Montenegro | 90 |
Saudi Arabia | 81 |
Ireland | 73 |
Algeria | 66 |
Luxembourg | 50 |
Belarus | 48 |
Republic of Moldova | 44 |
Greece | 41 |
Egypt | 39 |
Romania | 38 |
France | 22 |
Belgium | 22 |
Italy | 19 |
San Marino | 18 |
Jordan | 18 |
Latvia | 15 |
Bosnia and Herzegovina | 5 |
Switzerland | 4 |
Tajikistan | 2 |
Kyrgyzstan | 2 |
Where are Research Centres of Pfizer Patents Located?

What is Pfizer working on?
Right now, Pfizer is prioritizing its research and development efforts in areas where they can make a difference to health and social care burdens: Cardiovascular, metabolic and rare disease, Immunology and inflammation, Neuroscience and pain, Oncology, Vaccines.
10 Best Pfizer Patents
US20040167572A1 is the most popular patent in the Pfizer portfolio. It has received 1409 citations so far from companies like Boston Scientific Scimed, Atrium Medical Corporation, and Ethicon, Inc.
Below is the list of 10 most cited patents of PFIZER:
Publication Number | Count of Citing Patents |
US20040167572A1 | 1409 |
US6207646B1 | 1174 |
US6239116B1 | 981 |
US6194388B1 | 773 |
US6408336B1 | 736 |
US6178505B1 | 640 |
US6301493B1 | 625 |
US6429199B1 | 624 |
US7488802B2 | 552 |
US6682736B1 | 518 |
Which Companies are using Pfizer Patents to Advance their Research?
If patents or patents from a particular technology area of a company receive a lot of citations, it implies that the technology is being followed and incrementally innovated by the citing companies. It also indicates that citing companies are working on similar and closely related technologies.
The top citing companies in the Pfizer patent portfolio are Boehringer Ingelheim, Novartis and Merck Sharp & Dohme Corp.
List of the top forward citing Companies –
Company | Number of Patents |
Boehringer Ingelheim | 95 |
Novartis | 61 |
Merck Sharp & Dohme Corp | 47 |
Protia | 47 |
Glaxosmithkline | 44 |
Concert Pharmaceuticals | 44 |
Becton Dickinson | 42 |
Genentech | 33 |
Amgen | 31 |
Samsung | 28 |
Count of 102 and 103 Type Rejections based on Pfizer Patents

Top pfizer Patents used in Rejecting Most Patent Applications
Patent Number | Count of Rejected Applications |
US6603008B1 | 152 |
US7945452B2 | 32 |
US8642831B2 | 19 |
US6911217B1 | 19 |
US6194000B1 | 19 |
US8709483B2 | 18 |
US7972378B2 | 18 |
US7864161B2 | 18 |
US7896916B2 | 17 |
US20040208910A1 | 17 |
US7815934B2 | 16 |
US7760137B2 | 16 |
US7250037B2 | 16 |
US20080068920A1 | 16 |
US8914410B2 | 15 |
What Percentage of Pfizer US Patent Applications were Granted?
Pfizer (Excluding its subsidiaries) has filed 5037 patent applications at USPTO so far (Excluding Design and PCT applications). Out of these 2400 have been granted leading to a grant rate of 71.41%.
Below are the key stats of Pfizer patent prosecution at the USPTO.

Which Law Firms Filed Most US Patents for Pfizer?
Law Firms | Total Applications | Success Rate |
Pfizer Inc | 1620 | 59.67% |
Gregg C Benson | 581 | 64.41% |
Peter C Richardson | 464 | 82.35% |
Paul H Ginsburg | 232 | 71.67% |
Charles J Knuth | 193 | 77.72% |
Zoetis | 100 | 87.88% |
Johnson & Johnson | 75 | 72.22% |
Dr Peter C Richardson | 69 | 95.83% |
Ronald S Courtney | 58 | 100.00% |
Jones Day | 55 | 53.85% |
EXCLUSIVE INSIGHTS COMING SOON!
What are Pfizer’s key innovation segments?
What Technologies are Covered by Pfizer?

The chart below distributes patents filed by Pfizer in different countries on the basis of the technology protected in patents. It also represents the markets where Pfizer thinks it’s important to protect particular technology inventions.

R&D Focus: How Pfizer search focus changed over the years?

EXCLUSIVE INSIGHTS COMING SOON!
Interested in knowing about the areas of innovation that are being protected by Pfizer?