Technology and Knowledge Diffusion
Technological innovation has a transformative, enduring impact on people’s lives. In the past, inventions could be developed and diffused to society by one entity. Today, cutting-edge innovations flow through complex global R&D and value chains in order to reach people, and technology convergence across sectors is the norm. IPRs play an important role in this flow. They are used by many actors, including companies and research institutes, to manage and share their technologies and know-how, and to move their inventions out of the lab and into society. IP rights provide legal certainty and clarity as to each innovator’s contributions to a project and ownership of the outcome. Having IP protection encourages collaboration across organizations, industry sectors, and borders. Over time, this “open innovation” can drive improvements in human capital and innovative capacity, giving rise to centers of excellence. Innovation Council members share their insights about collaborative innovation and other channels for knowledge diffusion, and the policies and tools that make this possible.
AI and 5G ranked as most significant technology trends for 2022 and beyond
The continuing rollout of 5G and the application of AI top the list of the most important technologies expected to grow in 2022, according to a survey of senior technology officers published by international technology organisation IEEE, Ron Alalouff reports. In the survey of 350 chief technology officers, chief information officers and IT directors, AI and machine learning, cloud computing and 5G were identified as the most important technologies for 2022 and beyond. Technology leaders said they had accelerated their adoption of cloud computing (60%), AI and machine learning (51%) and 5G (46%), due to the global pandemic. An overwhelming 95% of them agreed – and 66% strongly agreed – that AI will drive most innovation across almost all industry sectors in the next one to five years.
University to help health practitioners find innovative solutions to healthcare challenges
The growing challenges on healthcare systems around the world has inspired researchers at the University of Bath to devise an online course to help healthcare practitioners spot opportunities for innovation in their organisations, and put ideas into practise.
The free online course, known as a MOOC (Massive Open Online Course) takes four weeks to complete and is devised by the School of Management’s Centre for Healthcare Innovation and Improvement (CHI²), along with the West of England Academic Health Science Network (AHSN).
What South Korea’s vaccine industry success teaches us about global trade policy
Jennifer Brant of Innovation Council co-authored an article with Godfrey Firth for the World Economic Forum that uses the example of South Korea to show that tariff, trade facilitation and regulatory harmonisation measures can facilitate the global response to health crises such as COVID-19.
Capacity Building for Vaccine Manufacturing Across Developing Countries: The Way Forward
Innovation Council member Techinvention has published an article on capacity building for vaccine manufacturing. The authors of the paper show that challenges in the life cycle of vaccine production include process development, lead time, intellectual property, and local vaccine production. A robust and stable manufacturing process and constant raw material supplies over decades is critical. In a continuously evolving vaccine landscape, the need of the hour for developing nations is to manufacture their own vaccines besides having supply security, control over production scheduling and sustainability, control of costs, socio-economic development, and rapid response to local epidemics. There is a need for capacity building of workforce development, technology transfer, and financial support. Technology transfer has improved vaccine access and reduced prices of vaccines. Capacity building for the manufacturing of vaccines in developing countries has always been an area of paramount importance and more so in a pandemic situation.
How Technology is Reshaping the IP Management Industry
There’s hardly any area in entrepreneurship today that deals with innovation more than intellectual property rights protection – in fact, cutting-edge technology and inventions are at the core of the IP industry. However, this doesn’t necessarily mean that the real-life practices, processes, and management in the industry are as technologically advanced – it’s actually quite the contrary, or, at least, has been until recently. Following the footsteps of tech and service companies, the IP management market has also been exposed to global digitization and automation trends.
5G IP makes best with Patent Platform and Technology Investment
Mr. Jang-Hwa Leu, the Director General of Industrial Development Bureau, Ministry of Economic Affairs Taiwan, indicated that the semiconductor and ICT advantage of Taiwan is impregnable in the world. To keep the lead, intellectual property (IP) protection becomes vital. “5G is setting off a new industrial revolution… the key to be standing on firm ground is to control the latest innovation and IP,” said Mr. Leu.
Under the theme of “Maximising 5G IP value in Taiwan” and co-organized by Business Next, IPBC Taiwan 2021 presents in-depth speeches and discussions about IP and patent protection strategy as well as the value of 5G. The morning session includes senior executives and experts from Nissan Motor, Ericsson, Micron Technology, ARM, Intel, Nokia, and more. Apart from the critical 5G patents, the speakers also shared their insights toward the development of 6G.
ITU – Digital Transformation for cities and communities webinar, 6 December 2021
The accelerated digital transformation has also increased the risk of cyber security threats. As IoT deployment becomes more frequent and sophisticated, smart cities and communities are also becoming more vulnerable to various data breaches. City leaders must be prepared to respond to increased cyber risks and prioritize privacy, security, and trust as the key components of digital transformation, particularly in developing countries.
This webinar will examine the security implication of digital transformation and look at the global development on managing security risks in smart cities and communities. It will also shed light on the latest international standards that are available to enhance the security capability of IoTs and other related systems and applications.
Unprecedented: The Rapid Innovation Response to COVID-19 and the Role of Intellectual Property
On 26 November the new research report about the role that intellectual property played in the development, manufacturing, and global distribution of COVID-19 vaccines and therapeutics was launched in Geneva. The report was co-authored by Innovation Council’s very own Jennifer Brant, and Prof. Mark Schultz.
The report, along with other materials including an executive summary is available here.
Route to Market Guide for Innovators
The Route to Market (R2M) series is being developed by the Department of Research Contracts & Innovation (RC&I) at the University of Cape Town using funding from the Department of Science and Technology’s National Intellectual Property Office (NIPMO). Each booklet focuses on a specific sector/product type and highlights the key steps and considerations in bringing such a product to market in that sector – with an emphasis on the local South African context.
The hope is that this guide on Medical Devices and other booklets, such as this guide on Pharmaceutical Products will be useful to both Researchers and Innovators, as well as Technology Transfer professionals working at institutional Technology Transfer Offices (TTOs).
The books have been released under a Creative Commons license to enable other institutions to customise them for their own use.