Companies that own IP rights have 20% higher revenue per employee than companies that do not. That is one of the key findings from the latest EUIPO/EPO report comparing the economic performance of companies that own IP rights with those that do not.

The report is available on the EUIPO website here. The Executive Summary in English is here. It is published by the EUIPO, through the Observatory on Infringements of Intellectual Property Rights, and the EPO, and analyses European and national patents, trade marks and design rights.

It develops previous studies on the economic contribution of IP, which were published in 2013, 2016 and 2019 and is an update of a study published in 2015. The 2019 report found that industries that make above-average use of IP rights contributed 29% of employment and 45% of GDP in the EU.

The latest study analysed a representative sample of over 127,000 European firms in 28 EU member states (including the UK), based on data from 2007 to 2019.

Key findings

The study found that, correcting for relevant factors such as sector, company size and country, this revenue premium companies owning IP rights rises to 55% and even higher for SMEs.

Companies owning IP rights also pay wages that are on average 19% higher than firms that do not own IP rights.

About 60% of large companies own IP rights. Although fewer than 9% of small businesses own IP rights, the firms that do have 68% more revenue per employee than firms that do not.