DT 25/21 - Invención y patentes en Uruguay: evidencia empírica entre 1970 y 2018

This document compiles, systematizes and analyses patent data in Uruguay for the first time. For this purpose, it uses the official records of patents filed at the Uruguayan Patent Office. The paper explains the processing of the original records to generate a database for research purposes. Subsequently, a descriptive study of the data is carried out, analyzing the temporal evolution of patents between 1970 and 2018, the territorial distribution of invention activities in the country's regions, the technological specialization of inventions, the main companies and organizations, and the participation of actors residing abroad. The results provide some interesting findings about innovation processes in the country. These include the growth experienced by the number of patents registered since 1990, the high territorial concentration, as well as a positive association between patenting levels and regional development indicators. This evidence also illustrates the diverse possibilities presented by patent data to study innovation processes in countries such as Uruguay.