Bank of America Corp. has hit a 50% year-over-year increase in patents granted — marking another record for innovation.
BofA (NYSE: BAC) announced today the bank was granted 341 patents during the first half of this year, a jump from 227 during mid-year 2021. The seven tech categories granted include programming technology (18%), artificial intelligence and machine learning (20%), information security (21%), payment technology (16%), mobile banking (14%), blockchain (6%) and data analytics (5%).
The Charlotte-based bank has logged 5,556 pending or granted patents in its history, has 6,500 patent inventors across 43 states and 14 countries, 26% women inventors and 1,000 information security patents pending or granted.
“The diversity of our patent-winning portfolio represents the diverse experiences and unique perspectives of more than 6,500 inventors around the world,” said Aditya Bhasin, BofA’s chief technology and information officer in a statement. “Their desire to address client needs, safeguard client information and create new solutions that helps clients build better financial lives drives our record-breaking patents streak.”
Michael Young, a top BofA inventor, has filed 65 patents since 2018 including cybersecurity, artificial intelligence, data security and more. Young told CBJ that working for a leading company in innovation brings constant pressure to continue creating new technologies for customers and clients. “All of those phases are heavy areas of investment but ultimately it's there to make sure that customers are delighted with the experiences and technology associated with their money,” he said.
Young said creating a patent starts with ideation. Groups of inventors constantly share inventing sessions and discuss ways to solve problems in technology, he said. Once an inventing session is complete and a concept is formed, Young said the inventors formalize their ideas in a PowerPoint. It then goes through patent research and a patent application is drafted, which can take up to three months. The patent application is filed at a patent office and can take about two years to be granted.
“I essentially caught the bug and really enjoyed the process,” he said. “It's really enjoyable to be around a lot of creative, intelligent people trying to solve problems. So I continued with that and have been submitting ever since (2018)… Patents are a wonderful way to essentially give someone a lifetime achievement award and technology award. And I'm really proud to be a part of that.”
In 2020, BofA increased its annual budget for new technology to $3.6 billion versus $3 billion executed in 2010, CBJ previously reported. The bank budgets about $10.7 billion for technology annually.
