IBM received more U.S. patents than any other company in 2004, marking the 12th consecutive year Big Blue has topped the list of patent winners. To celebrate the occasion, IBM pledged to make available 500 of the software patents it holds to the open-source community.

IBM says it will give free access to key innovations covered by 500 of its existing software patents to individuals and groups working on open source software, in an effort to help foster continued innovation. 

Its open source pledge covers a broad range of patents, including some related to interoperability features of operating systems and databases, as well as Internet, user interface and language processing technologies, IBM says. Several of the patents to be released are related to dynamic linking processes for operating systems, and one pertains to file-export protocols.

Meanwhile, IBM was granted 3,277 patents in 2004, according to figures released Tuesday by IFI CLAIMS Patent Services, a division of Wolters Kluwer Health. That's 1,312 more than the second-ranked company, Matsushita Electric Industrial Company, which received 1,965 patents in 2004.

But it's 162 fewer than the 3,439 U.S. patents IBM earned in 2003.

IBM isn't the only company with lower patent numbers. For the first time since 1995, the total number of U.S. patents issued declined as compared to year-earlier figures. In 2004, a total of 164,402 patents were issued, down 2.7% from 2003.  

Darlene Slaughter, general manager of IFI CLAIMS Patent Services, says that it's too early to understand the significance of the decline in patents granted. “It's really hard to draw any conclusions at this point. There are so many factors that can effect the number of patents that get issued during the year," Slaughter says.

For example, IFI CLAIMS tracks only the number of patents granted in a year, not the number of new applications filed. Next year’s numbers will give a better indication of whether this is the beginning of a downward trend, Slaughter says.

Among the top patent-earning companies, IT vendors made a strong showing in IFI CLAIMS' list. Those in the top 20 include IBM; HP, ranked 4th with 1,780 patents; Micron Technology, ranked 5th with 1,761 patents; Intel, ranked 7th with 1,604 patents; Renesas Technology, ranked 15th with 917 patents; Texas Instruments, ranked 16th with 916 patents; NEC, ranked 19th with 826 patents; and Advanced Micro Devices, ranked 20th with 803 patents.