In its year-end review, the World Intellectual Property Office (WIPO) provided that following three consecutive years of double-digit growth, 2013 saw a modest 2.5% growth in the number of industrial designs contained in applications (i.e. design counts). The slowdown in worldwide filing activity was due to a sharp slowdown in filings in China, which is reflected by only a 0.3% growth in filings between 2012 and 2013. In 2013, China accounted for 53% of global total design filings. In 2013, applications containing around 1.24 million designs were filed worldwide, comprising 1.06 million designs from residents and 180,000 from non-residents. Turkey played a leading role in contributing towards the global growth in design filings. According to WIPO, Turkey showed the highest growth rate of 10.3% in design filings between 2012 and 2013 and contributed 4.1% of the world’s total filing in 2013. In addition to China and Turkey, the top offices that contributed to the World’s grown in design filings are OHIM (EU office), Germany and the Republic of Korea. (wipo.int; 14 December 2014)
