Bengaluru: The session on the ‘Impact of IP on Innovation leading to ease of doing Business’ at the Bangalore Tech Summit 2020 highlighted the importance of IP legislative gaps and the way forward for India to become a technological hub.
Eminent speakers from Indian and multinational companies, institutions, government, international agencies and enforcement agencies gave their perspective on how IP on Innovation leading to ease of doing business.
Dr. SK Murthy, Patent Counsel, Intel India said that India has come a long way in IP and demonstrated its will and grit to make its IP system robust and world class.
The new amendments to the IP laws are in the right direction to make India a technological hub. According to him, E-filing, modernization of offices and faster examination of patent claims are commendable effort, but we still have a long way to go.
He is of the opinion that India needs to have a focused effort on simplifying section 3K of our patent law, knowing the status of a patent filed, transfer of IP, enhancing education of IP at all level including judiciary and technology upgradation programmes for the country to get to the next level.
He also called for setting up an IPR Bench at the High Court in Bangalore as the city is the hub of technology and innovation in the country.
According to Kumar Ranganathan, Independent Technology Strategy Advisor, today India exports many goods like textiles, gems, cotton, iron etc. but the margins on these products are very low when compared to products that are IP rich, like a commercial aircraft.
He said that, when it comes to high technology you can compete either on price or on technical knowhow. India still largely competes on price and depends on cheap labour for that, but we must set our goal on competing on IP, as it offers much more sustainable differentiation in the long run.
The focus on IP cannot happen without some significant change in the Indian ecosystem especially with regard to R&D spending. India spend only 0.6% – 0.7% of GDP on R&D, this is very low even when we compare with other BRICS countries. Japan sees 200 times more patent filing than India every year.
Kumar Ranganathan states that until and unless we shift our focus towards R&D India can forget about being a superpower or even achieving tech independence. Therefore the focus on Make in India should not be only on manufacturing but also on making technological knowhow.
For making India a technological super power, Kumar Ranganathan says that India needs a pool of post graduate scientific and technical institutes and get world-class institutions to set up their campuses in India so that talented students should stay in India for higher studies and research. 18% of 1 million foreign students in US are from India. Industry in India should set up global standards with IPs and start selling products to the developed countries.
He also called on for much better collaboration between Industry and academia for research and invest in R&D and innovation rather than just executing someone else’s ideas. He is of the opinion that only with technology and IP India can produce for the world.
Dr. Ravi Tumkur, IP Council, Philips, said that for India to become a technological powerhouse, it should adopt IP regime to changing technological scenario. According to him patent examination should be made faster so that organizations can bring forth their innovations to the market.
He also called on the government to simplify the clause in the new IP Amendment which states that the company should declare the revenue generated by a particular patent as it is difficult to arrive at a value of a component in a product. He says that the new amendment which focuses on the value is going in the wrong direction. He also called on the government to set up a patent office in Bengaluru as it where most innovations happen in the country.
The session also saw Erik Azulay, Director, ACIR, Ramakrishna Thammaiah, Professor of Law at National Law School, and John Cabeca, United States Intellectual Property Attaché for South Asia deliberating on various aspects of Indian and Global patent laws, how India is poised be a global technology hub and the direction in which the country should take to achieve it.
