Microsoft posts 10,000th patent

Microsoft Tuesday said it recorded its 10,000th U.S. patent, which came on the back of technology used in its Surface computing platform.

U.S. Patent No. 7,479,950 covers a technology that lets users place objects on a surface and have them associated with data or media stored on the computer's hard drive. A user could place a set of car keys on the surface and the computer could bring up that person's schedule or list of favorite TV shows airing that night.

Microsoft says the company is ranked fourth among companies with the most U.S. patents. In 2008 alone, Microsoft rival IBM was granted 4,186 patents, a record for a single year, to Microsoft's 2,030.

Microsoft says it spends roughly $8 billion a year on R&D, a figure it says tops any other technology company.

Curtis Wong, who is one of four Microsoft Research co-inventors of the technology, said in a statement: "The goal of this patent is to make the interaction between the physical and virtual worlds a little more seamless."

Wong, who has authored 45 patents, also was a co-inventor in 2006 on Microsoft's 5,000th patent, a technology that let people become spectators in online video games. Last year, Wong was part of a group that launched the Worldwide Telescope