Cixi and Yuyao in Ningbo, East China's Zhejiang province was ranked among the top 10 county-level cities nationwide in terms of intellectual property (IP) competitiveness by a recent report.

Cixi was ranked fifth on the list, the highest in Zhejiang, while Yuyao came in 10th.

Compiled by the Institute of New Structural Economics & Intellectual Property, the report evaluated 395 county-level cites across the nation using parameters such IP investment, IP application, IP protection and IP services.

It is the first report on IP competitiveness of county-level cities released by China.

In 2020, the number of patents authorized in Cixi reached 10,690, up 39.5 percent year-on-year.

To date, valid invention patents owned by the city stand at 2,475.

International patent applications filed via WIPO's Patent Cooperation Treaty (PCT), one of the most widely used metrics for measuring innovative activity, also grew to 36, an increase of 63.6 percent year-on-year.

Meanwhile, Yuyao now possesses a total of 3,257 valid invention patents, which means every 10,000 residents owns 27 invention patents in the city.