Shanghai among first WIPO 'City of Innovation' award winners

Shanghai, along with Charleroi in Belgium and Liverpool in the United Kingdom, has been named among the inaugural winners of the World Intellectual Property Organization’s (WIPO) “City of Innovation” awards program.

Launched this year, the award recognizes proactive actions by cities to empower urban transformation by unlocking creative potential and fostering innovation-driven development. These three winning cities ultimately stood out from 15 shortlisted cities across 11 countries.

Why did Shanghai make the list? Here are two sets of data Shanghai submitted to WIPO:

In 2025, Shanghai's gross domestic product (GDP) reached 5.67 trillion yuan, or about 843.1 billion USD, placing it among the world's top 5 cities by economic aggregate.

As of June 2026, the city had 67.6 high-value invention patents per 10,000 people. Shanghai's world-first achievements have evolved from isolated cases into a broader phenomenon.

In September this year, a survey of global scientists and innovators, jointly released by the Shanghai Institute of Science and Springer Nature, found that 28% of respondents were willing to relocate to Shanghai in the future. This proportion ranked fourth globally and was highest among Chinese cities.

The Shanghai Intellectual Property Administration has implemented institutional reforms to accelerate patent authorization and help technology companies seize market opportunities. In the first half of this year alone, the city accepted more than 6,000 qualified patent pre-examination cases.

Shanghai is also fully leveraging the high-end platforms of the Shanghai Innovation Institute and the Shanghai International College of Intellectual Property to build up high-level international talent reserves for the development of a science and innovation center.