With a long-term strategy for intellectual property rights, AUO is a dedicated player in advanced display technology R&D and green technology applications. In the recent Top 100 Global Innovators 2025 revealed by Clarivate, the company has been recognised for the fourth consecutive year, with its outstanding achievements in innovation widely acknowledged.
To sustain AUO’s market leadership and expand its influence, AUO is constantly committed to innovation and green patents. As of the end of 2024, it has obtained 4,500 energy conservation and carbon reduction patents worldwide. In particular, the issued patents related to the advanced display technology – Micro LED – are making up a growing proportion of annually issued patents, reaching over 80 percent in 2024, demonstrating the company’s enormous capability for innovation.
Priority for innovation
According to Clarivate, the Top 100 organisations prioritise innovation as an essential part of their business strategy, and their investment level in science, engineering, product design and problem-solving is, on average, 8.8 percent of their revenues. For the 2025 selection, Clarivate went beyond the influence, success, investment and rarity of patents, and also analysed the convergence phenomenon through five macro-forces that shape innovation, providing a framework to simplify and measure these effects: Sustainability, Wellbeing, Mobility, Connectivity and Automation.
“Intellectual property rights are AUO’s core assets and the key to maintaining our competitive edge in the global market. Leveraging a mature IP system and strategic patenting, with display technology as our core, AUO has developed numerous innovative experiences in consumer electronics and commercial applications in people’s lives,” said Wei-Lung Liau, Chief Technology Officer of AUO. “More importantly, the company has also boosted the added value of its offerings across verticals such as smart mobility, retail, healthcare, education and enterprise, and energy by integrating software and hardware solutions. With a precise grasp of customer needs and market trends, we harness the synergy between R&D capability and industrial resources and strive to play a greater role in the cross-domain ecosystem for concerted value creation.”
Commitment to patenting
Gordon Samson, President, Intellectual Property, Clarivate, said, “Being recognised as a Top 100 Global Innovator is a remarkable achievement given the pace of change – since 2000, we’ve seen an 80-fold increase in the volume of inventions. Competition is more global than ever before, and developments in one region can have a significant global impact. AUO distinguishes itself through its unwavering commitment to patenting, confidently executing an international coverage strategy that effectively bolsters its investments. We congratulate AUO for being named a Top 100 Global Innovator for four consecutive years.”
AUO has strengthened its efforts in innovation on key path technologies, while inspiring researchers’ creative innovations through dedicated projects, not only keeping the momentum of inventions in response to R&D investments, but also the value of innovations. Moreover, it pursues the continued growth of its strategic patent portfolio worldwide. By the end of 2024, AUO amassed over 32,000 patent applications and over 24,700 issued patents worldwide, with 97 percent of its R&D innovations in invention patents.
In response to increasingly severe climate change all over the world, AUO has long been working on green technology R&D, while making a proactive plan for green patents by blending green innovation concepts into its business philosophy. Specifically, AUO continues to develop energy conservation and carbon reduction processes and products, including innovative technologies such as mini LED and Micro LED, as well as OLED, LED light bar and E-paper, as part of its efforts to help minimize energy consumption. On the alternative energy front, AUO offers manufacturing processes, equipment, and products related to solar cells. As of the end of 2024, AUO has obtained 4,500 energy conservation and carbon reduction patents worldwide, with the proportion of Micro LED patents expanding year by year and exceeding 80 percent in 2024.
State-of-the-art Micro LED production process
For many years, AUO has been at the forefront of Micro LED display technology innovation and has built a state-of-the-art Micro LED production process with its ecosystem partners. Technically, Micro LED has surpassed size and format restrictions, which may be applied to small and medium-sized smart wearables such as watches and glasses, innovative display human-machine interface inside and outside of the smart cockpit, and large-size splicing screens in the retail and entertainment sectors; and it also provides an optimal display interface for AI-based software and hardware applications. From daily life to technological trends, AUO turns people’s imaginations about the future of vision into reality through persistent technological innovation.
Upholding innovation and sustainability, AUO will remain committed to the R&D and application of advanced technology, enhance its global patent portfolio, and collaborate with ecosystem partners to unlock the immense potential of innovation and cooperation, driving technological advancements in the industry.