Three companies – Samsung, IBM and Tencent – dominate the global AI patent race over the past 10 years, while fierce competition between the U.S, and China overshadows other countries and regions, including the EU. These are the key findings of OxFirst, a specialist in IP law and economics (and spin out of Oxford University), which also reported that multiple neural nets, machine learning and speech recognition are driving the market. "Patents are mainly filed in the area of interconnectivity and system architecture, suggesting that top players focus primarily on protecting technologies covering multiple neural nets," OxFirst said in its announcement today. "Other areas of crucial importance are ML and bootstrap methods, alongside procedures used during speech recognition processes; e.g. the further establishment of human-machine dialogue." OxFirst said its sector-specific analysis suggests that major companies have focused on AI in the medical space, particularly medical diagnosis, medical simulation and data mining.