How female inventors can fix STEM’s gender gap

By Cynthia Tregillis and Sabra Truesdale | Jan 19, 2022

Just as a gender gap exists in the STEM workforce, a gender gap also exists in patenting activity. According to the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) Intellectual Property (IP) Statistics Data Center, the share of female inventors out of all inventors named on Patent Cooperation Treaty (PCT) applications filed in 2020 was 16%. While the share of PCT applications filed in 2020 that included at least one female inventor was higher at 32%, this number still indicates that over two-thirds of the PCT applications did not include any female inventors.

Using the patent process to help close the gender gap in the STEM workforce will benefit not only organizations but also women. The STEM gender gap goes beyond headcount. Women in STEM also lag behind their male counterparts financially and from a leadership perspective. Increasing women’s participation in patenting activity will yield higher job satisfaction and headcount retention among women, which will allow women greater opportunities to rise to leadership positions in STEM, which in turn will help increase their earnings. Read the whole article at: https://www.johnsonstem.org/post/why-girls-are-better-at-math-but-don-t-get-stem-jobs-confidence-is-the-key