The Role of the IP Office in the 21st Century

Transcript:The Role of the IP Office in the 21st Century:
The Role of the IP Office in the 21st Century The Innovation IP Office in terms of supporting Small and Medium-Sized Enterprises (SMEs) Alfred Radauer, IMC University of Applied Sciences Krems, Austria 24 August 2020 – WIPO Webinar on „IP Offices as Innovation Agencies“ Innovation policy on IP The typical / traditional view A topic largely at the fringe: Patent counts Technology transfer No discussion of IP offices Source: Kuhlmann & Arnold, 2001 Because of actual transformation towards more service-orientation (new public management) Because of need to find new business / activity (in addition to and/or in lieu of examination) Different levels of innovation Does more than what the traditional IP office does (type ‘A‘), like having dedicated SME support services Does improve on traditional registration/examination (type ‘B’) Particularly/recently or constantly innovative, in addition to type ‘A’ and ‘B’ (type ‘A.1’ or ‘B.1’) The path towards becoming innovative as IP office A „typical“ institutional set-up Single SME National R&D funding agency - R&D grants Thematic programmes National innovation funding agency start-up support business growth support innovation support programmes Regional funding agency Start up support business growth support Innovation support programmes Chamber of commerce Consultation & information training Private Consultants - support in anything Patent Office Associated with filing of patents PIC, TTO Patent attorney Uni-versity IPR support Innovation support Types of IP services provided Typology *) 1. (Pro-active) awareness raising activities and public relations 2. (Passive) information provision services 3. Training 4. Customized in-depth consulting and advisory points/services 5. Financial assistance & legal framework Benchmarking studies have shown that only few services perform well In the recent past, many activities in relation to tool and service development (at European level: IPorta, VIP4SMEs…) Many IP offices have restructured their service offerings Some trend towards ‘IP Audit’-type services Major offerings in relation to basic information and patent search *) Source: Radauer et al., 2007 There is no such thing as “the” SME. SMEs may not be too much into patenting, but a differentiated view may be necessary whether this is truly a bad thing. SMEs can be on both the right holders and the (alleged) infringer end of IP enforcement. Reaching out to SMEs to support them needs consideration in terms of the „how“, „with what“ and „when“. SMEs usually don´t like lawyers, but they like good business. As for an IP office: How much do you want to / can you