The USPTO and KIPO announced today that starting in January 2015 the KIPO will classify its patent applications and utility models under the Cooperative Patent Classification (CPC) system. Korea ranks fourth after China, the U.S. and Japan in the number of patent applications filed annually.

The USPTO and EPO have been developing the CPC, which is based on the International Patent Classification (IPC) and the European Classification (ECLA) systems, since 2010.