Indians hot on patents, file 13,000 applications

NEW DELHI: Since 1998 when India entered the Patent Co-operation Treaty (PCT), 2,40,000 patent applications have been received worldwide which designate India as the country where the patent is to be operated. This not only gives an indication of global industry intention to operate and invest in India, but is also a vote of confidence in the IPR system here.
Of course “designating� a country only means making an advance reservation, “whether or not you actually travel there remains to be seen,� points out Wang Zhengfa, director, developing countries (PCT) Division, World Intellectual Property Organisation (WIPO) Geneva. He is here to attend the WIPO sub-regional symposium on the benefits of the PCT for developing and least-developed countries which began in the Capital today.
Happily for India, about 13,000 applications have entered national phase — a term for applications actually filed at the Patent Office in India. As VK Malhotra, additional secretary, ministry of commerce and industry observed in his inaugural speech, “It reveals an emerging trend in international filing of applications for protection of inventions in the Indian market.�
In fact the PCT route is being used by Indian inventors as well — so far about 500 international applications designating other member countries have been filed in the Indian Patent Office.
According to Niloy Kumar Gupta, assistant controller of patents & designs, The Patent Office, Kolkata, the main categories under which the applications have come in are in electronics (22%), chemicals (27 %), drugs (17%), food (2% — only Indian ‘process’ applications) mechanical (17%) and rest general. While 30% of the applications are from the US, Japan and Korea account for 7% (mostly in electronics) while European countries have filed maximum applications in mechanical and chemical sectors.