Intellectual Property

DENSO steadily applies the outcomes of R&D to future businesses and manages this extensive portfolio of intellectual property (patents, trademarks, copyrights, and other intellectual property in its portfolio) as an essential asset for ensuring competitiveness and securing alliances with partners.
On managing its intellectual property portfolio, DENSO aims to elevate the level of IP-focused management that benefits corporate management, leaning into IP strategies for each business and product line while bolstering the cycle of value creation, returns, profit generation, and growth investments through mutual dialogues among management and business, R&D, and IP divisions.

DENSO is focusing on R&D in growth fields and new fields. We design our IP portfolio by backcasting from a vision for the future, based on core technologies and a story about value creation that helps solve social issues.

In addition to discussing IP strategies for each business, DENSO holds various meetings to deliberate on the planning and implementation of IP investment strategies from the perspective of Companywide IP management. Through these discussions, we aim to demonstrate and increase DENSO’s corporate value by integrating management and IP activities.

To support overseas development and design, we have set up IP organizations at our development and design bases in North America, Europe, and China, thereby strengthening our efforts to acquire and use IP rights for local inventions and examine other companies’ IP rights. Furthermore, at our locations in North America and Europe, we deploy patent attorneys to provide support in patent disputes. In China, we are strengthening protection of the DENSO brand by taking measures against counterfeit products and copyright infringements. In addition, we hold the Global IP Conference on a regular basis with the aim of resolving Groupwide and local issues pertaining to IP management and enhancing our governance in all regions of operation.

DENSO views problems related to other companies’ IP rights as equally important as major quality problems that impact its own corporate value. From the development stage, the Company examines the IP rights of other companies and has clearly defined internal rules, for which strict compliance is observed, to ensure that its products and services do not infringe on the IP rights of third parties.

DENSO takes appropriate and lawful steps to combat infringement of its IP rights by third parties. These measures are actively taken not only for patents but also, for example, against counterfeit products.
There are many quality-related problems with counterfeit products, including with imitation trademarks, and there is the possibility that purchasing such a product in the belief that it was manufactured by DENSO could be detrimental to the purchaser. Since 2005, the Company has been engaging in ongoing activities to detect counterfeit products in cooperation with government and customs agencies as well as its overseas locations in North America, Europe, and China.

In light of the ongoing changes in the added value of automobiles as a form of mobility, DENSO has been expanding its contribution from the traditional areas of mobility and Monozukuri to the greater area of society, while accelerating its technology development from an environmental, safety, and reliability point of view. By utilizing the IP accumulated through these efforts, we will help resolve the issues of society and further increase our corporate value.