Philippines: An Intellectual Property Overview

The Philippines’ Commitment to Innovation Drives Its Steady Rise in the WIPO Global Innovation Index

The Philippines climbed to 50^th among 139 countries (breaking through the top 1/3 of the countries ranked) in the latest 2025 Global Innovation Index (GII) of the World Intellectual Property Office (WIPO), fuelled by its strong commitment to innovation and research. Since 2022, the country has steadily made its way up through the rankings: 59^th in 2022, 56^th in 2023, and 53^rd in 2024. With its current ranking, the Philippines is 3^rd among 37 lower middle-income group economies and 11^th among 17 in Southeast Asia, East Asia, and Oceania.

It also demonstrated growth in various indicators monitored by the Global Innovation Tracker of the GII. The Philippines recorded growth both in the short-term and long-term for scientific publications, venture capital deal numbers, international patent filings, safe sanitation, robots, labour productivity, and life expectancy, and in the short-term in 5G innovation. While the Philippines declined in fixed broadband innovation from 2022–2023, the long-term growth from 2013–2023 is still positive. These indicators reflect the current state of innovation in the country, and the rapid adaptation of technology and its resulting societal impacts.

The Philippines continues to perform above expectation for its level of development in terms of innovation performance, which is computed based on the relationship between income levels (GDP per capita) and innovation performance (GII score).

As for the Philippines’ specific ranking in the seven areas of the GII, the country recorded its highest ranking in knowledge and technology outputs (38^th) and in business sophistication (40^th).

The Register of Well-Known Marks

As of 10 August 2025, the Jollibee logo mark and the full image of Jollibee are the first registered well-known marks in the Philippines under the newly launched rules and regulations for the declaration and creation of the Register of Well-Known Marks.

The Philippine Intellectual Property Office (IPOPHL) recently issued the rules through Memorandum Circular No 2025-009 which establish an ex parte system for declaring well-known marks to be registered in the IPOPHL’s Register of Well-Known Marks. Prior to this, trade mark owners needed to go through adversarial litigation in court for their mark to be declared as well-known.

A Declaration of Well-Known Mark (“Declaration”), once secured, is prima facie evidence of the well-known status of a mark with respect to the goods and services it covers. The Declaration is valid for ten years, renewable every ten years, provided that the trade mark owner submits proof of continuous use in commerce and proof of well-known status of the mark.

The Register will likewise include other well-known marks which were previously declared as such by the Philippine Supreme Court, like “In-N-Out Burgers” which was declared as the country’s first well-known mark in the case of In-N-Out Burger v Sehwani, Incorporated, GR No 179127 (24 December 2008).

Music and copyright in the Philippines

The copyright landscape in the Philippines has shown a promising growth trajectory in recent years. From a commercial standpoint, the Philippines garnered the second highest year-on-year growth rate (17.9%) in Southeast Asia in terms of total revenues from recorded music in 2024 (USD88.3 million), as reported by the International Federation of the Phonographic Industry (IFPI). To further push Philippine music higher in global IFPI rankings, the IPOPHL announced its intention to focus efforts on intensifying copyright awareness to support the protection, distribution and monetisation of Filipino music globally.

Based on IFPI’s Global Music Report, 91.6% (USD80.9 million) of the total 2024 revenues were attributable to the streaming of recorded music, while 6.7% (USD5.9 million) were from downloads and other digital formats of recorded music, 1% (USD0.9 million) were from synchronisation of recorded music, 0.5% (USD0.5 million) were from performance rights, and 0.3% (USD0.3 million) were from revenues from physical formats like CDs and vinyls.

As revenues from recorded music continue to soar, the IPOPHL’s push for awareness on copyright becomes more significant especially in light of legal developments on copyright infringement.

In Filipino Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers, Inc. v Anrey, Inc., GR No 233918 (9 August 2022), the Philippine Supreme Court ruled that the unlicensed playing of radio broadcasts as background music in dining areas of a restaurant amounts to copyright infringement.

Citing its earlier ruling in FILSCAP v Anrey, Inc., supra, the Philippine Supreme Court, in Icebergs Food Concepts, Inc. v FILSCAP, GR No 256091 (12 April 2023), likewise found Icebergs liable for copyright infringement for playing copyrighted musical works of FILSCAP in its restaurants without consent. However, in this case, the Philippine Supreme Court urged Congress to consider allowing exemptions for small businesses in copyright infringement cases.

Further, in Filipino Society of Composers and Publishers v Wolfpac Communications, Inc.,GR No 184661 (25 February 2025), the Philippine Supreme Court addressed whether the act of allowing customers to listen to 20-second audio samples of ring-back tones before purchase constitutes infringement.

The Supreme Court ruled that the “pre-listening function” constitutes communication to the public which is beyond the scope of licence rights granted by the composers. Particularly, the composers only authorised the conversion of musical works into downloadable ringtones and their commercial distribution. Nevertheless, the Supreme Court ruled that the pre-listening function qualified as fair use.

Recent government initiatives on Philippine IP policy

The Philippines has recently released its Artificial Intelligence (AI) Roadmap 2.0 which aims to build on the country’s first AI Roadmap issued in May 2021. The Roadmap lays down the country’s policy on AI and recognises AI’s importance in the transformation of the industry, and its impact not only on the economy and businesses, but also its impact on society as a whole. The Philippine Department of Trade and Industry is the lead agency for this initiative.

The AI Roadmap contains four major dimensions for AI readiness:

1. research and development;
2. digitalisation and infrastructure;
3. workforce development; and
4. AI governance and ethics.

Through the said four dimensions, the Philippine government recognises the large potential of AI to be beneficial in various sectors and the importance of not only providing for robust infrastructure for AI, but also generating the talent to use said technology. The Roadmap also highlights the ethical use of AI through the adherence to principles of responsible AI use.

The Philippine Senate has also rolled out its initiative to upgrade the country’s IP laws. Senate Bill No 959 seeks to empower the IPOPHL to continue its fight against piracy. The proposed amendment to the IP Code redefines the terms “counterfeit goods” and “pirated goods” to cover a broader and more enforceable scope, and provides the IPOPHL with additional enforcement and monitoring powers to carry out its purpose. These powers include the authority to disable public access to a website giving unauthorised access to copyrighted material, after due notice and hearing.