IPmart’s technology perspective
The discussion of Canadian Innovation and Intellectual Property (IP) is ongoing. The goals are lofty and admirable: spurring-on innovation; inspiring inventors; improving patent value; improving Canadian competitiveness; and retaining the spoils of our innovation. There is considerable ground to cover.
Continually quoting foreign filing statistics will not accomplish these goals. Shaming inventors will not inspire them to innovate. What will inspire inventors? Technology inspires inventors. Patents become part of this inspiration by focusing on the technology, by making them relevant and by bringing them to life.
It is time to think creatively. It is time to explore a hypothetical case study.
Climate change is one of the most important issues of our time. Many see removing carbon dioxide from the atmosphere as an important piece of the solution puzzle. This leads straight to direct air capture, and the role it will play is directly related to its efficiency. At the moment it is not promising. The required improvement in efficiency might require bold insight into carbon dioxide’s fundamental structure.
Let’s say a Company has developed a new system for processing immense volumes of air but their capture technology is less efficient than desired. At the same time, research at University A produced several patents related to manipulating and breaking chemical bonds. Carbon dioxide is mentioned in an expansive list of alternatives in the patents, but it is not the focus. These patents are marketed at IPmart. As such the technology they present is summarized and their Frameworks are built.
A patent from University B presents complimentary technology that is related to University A’s technology. In fact, University B’s technology makes University A’s work squarely hit on carbon dioxide. Again, the patent is summarized and its Framework is built. The Frameworks identify the patents from University A and B as related.
Now, the fun part. The Company tasks an engineer with exploring IPmart for technology. The engineer readily appreciates the technologies in the above patents from their summaries and sees the link. But, she goes further, she sees how combining and building on the ideas solves the Company’s efficiency challenges. The Company licenses all the patents and then files its own patent application to protect her advance i.e invention. All of this became possible because the engineer readily appreciated the technology and the patents were linked through their Frameworks.
That is the power of starting from the technology. That is the power of IPmart.