|
EVEN as
patent filings continue to be low in the
Philippines—indicating either lack of vitality or
interest in innovation—an international
intellectual-property (IP) expert said Wednesday that
telecommunications, information technology (IT) and
pharmaceuticals dominated the list of patent-protection
seekers last year.
At the
First National Conference on IP and Technology
Commercialization in Makati City, senior program officer
Jared Nyagua of the World Intellectual Property
Organization (Wipo) said these industries make up about
30 percent of the protected and commercialized
technologies in the world—telecommunications accounts
for 10.5 percent; IT, 10.1 percent; and the
pharmaceutical industry, 9.3 percent.
That the
Philippines is lacking in innovation may not be
surprising, since the conference was also told that
nuclear engineering and telecommunications are the
fastest-growing areas of technology and innovation, both
of which are still very much in their infancy if not
totally absent—as in nuclear—in the country.
But IP
Philippines Director General Adrian Cristobal Jr. said
this could be changed to a
Philippines
active in invention through a change of mindset into a
“patent and profit” attitude.
“The
prevailing culture among universities and public RDI is
‘publish or perish’. The challenge now is to move from
the accepted tradition of publication to the actual
commercialization of their work. The sector can
contribute considerably to the country’s economic
development if it builds a culture of
commercialization,” urged Cristobal.
The
meeting was organized by the Intellectual Property
Office of the Philippines and the Commission on Higher
Education in an effort to spark interest in innovation
and spread awareness about intellectual-property
protection in the Philippines.
Cristobal cautioned that publication of scientific
findings and similar pieces on technology does not
secure the intellectual-property rights of the innovator
who develops that technology: “Once a study is
published, the [innovator] has one year within which to
actively develop and patent the technology” before the
published work becomes part of the public domain and
anybody who can access the published report can exploit
the technology without the study author’s consent.
While
the Intellectual Property Code of the Philippines is
“one of the most advanced” IP codes in the world—the
Philippines is Wipo-compliant and our IP regime is of
international standards—Cristobal lamented a severe
“lack of awareness” of the benefits and procedures for
IP protection through patenting and copyright
protection.
He
underlined the fact that investors confronted with new
technology now invariably ask, “Who owns that
intellectual property or technology?” This question must
be answered in order to attract investments and promote
national growth “through innovation,” stressed Cristobal.
“We have
a lot of work to do here. We have been reaching out to
several sectors through seminars, trade fairs, link-ups
with associations and chambers of commerce for more
awareness and information on patents and trademarks.”
In the
same two-day conference in
Makati
that opened Wednesday, Wipo’s Nyagua said in his
presentation: “Creation and protection of IP assets may
entail investments at the outset but there are rewards.
The United States, for instance, spends about $200
billion in research and development annually. However,
it also has the most number of filings in the Patent
Cooperation Treaty [PCT] at 53,147 out of the total
158,400 international applications in 2007.”
Other
countries showing much energy in innovation after the US
include Japan (27,732 applications), Germany (17,889),
and France (6,523).
According to Naygua, North East Asian countries account
for 25.4 percent of PCT filings over four consecutive
years from 2004 to 2007, with China and Japan among the
top 10 countries in the region to post high volumes of
PCT filings.
Three
companies in the region made it to the list of firms
leading PCT filings last year—Matsushita (Japan),
Huawei Technologies (China), and Toyota (Japan).
Cristobal said in his opening address that patent
filings are indicators of a nation’s economic,
innovative and technological development; and noted that
patent filings are low in the country, which has
consistently occupied a low rank in global surveys on
innovation. “Patent reform must be carried out in
pursuit of the country’s economic development. Patent
reform will be in the form of increased patent filing
count and commercialization of inventions.” |
