International Business Machines Corp. has done it again. In 2014, for the 22nd consecutive year, the technology giant topped the annual ranking of the largest recipients of U.S. patents issued by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office.

The top five patent recipients remained the same as in 2013, but Google Inc. and Apple Inc. moved up in the rankings, with Google breaking the top 10 for the first time, according to IFI Claims Patents Services, which compiles the rankings.

Nevertheless, the number of patents issued to the two Silicon Valley companies last year was far below the number issued to IBM. The Armonk, N.Y., company received 7,534 patents in 2014, the first time any company has broken the 7,000 mark for a single year. Big Blue's number was up 10.6 percent from 2013.