Abstract: This paper exhaustively combs through the changes of China’s patent agency mechanism and the development history of the patent agency business, and examines the effect of patent agency services on enterprise patent quality and the influence mechanism from the theoretical and empirical perspectives. The study finds that (1) Improving the level of urban patent agency services significantly improves the quality of enterprise patents and produces a stronger effect on invention patents. This finding remains robust after considering endogeneity issues, indicator selection, enterprise relocation, and the influence of neighboring cities. (2) The mechanism test finds that improving the level of patent agency services is more conducive to improving the patent quality of enterprises that are state-owned, in high-tech industries, located in inland cities, in their early years after inception, and with higher rates of patent agency. The research in this paper provides a feasible path for the effective implementation of China’s patent policy, which is of great practical significance for the high-quality development of innovation in China.

Key words: patent agent services, the listed company, patent quality, patent policy