The number of patents granted in China last year was 40 percent higher than in 2009, according to the national patent watchdog.

China's State Intellectual Property Office (SIPO) said in a statement Wednesday that it received over 1.2 million patent applications and approved 814,825 requests among them last year. The application number was over 25 percent more than that in 2009.

Among three types of patent applications administered by the SIPO, invention patents accounted for over 85 percent in each year's foreign applications since 2005, while domestic applications for invention patents accounted for 26 percent during the same period, it said.

The number of foreign applications for invention patents in 2010 rose about 15 percent from 2009, although the number of approved foreign applications dropped 12.3 percent.

Along with that drop, domestic applications experienced a large leap -- Chinese applications took over 59 percent of all invention patents granted in 2010. The figure was 50.9 in 2009, exceeding foreign applicants' share for the first time.

SIPO's statement attributes the rise to the improved quality of domestic inventions, the country's enhanced capacity in independent innovation and the growing awareness of intellectual property rights (IPRs).

The SIPO also released the result of an IPR protection campaign launched last November. Further, the country's IPR authorities had accepted over 400 patent disputes and resolved 233 patent counterfeiting cases.

(Xinhua News Agency January 13, 2011)