Comments for A New Journey Among the Global Intellectual Property Issues

Enforcement of IPR on the internet

INTRODUCTION
Nowadays, due to the expansionary growth of the internet, more and more intellectual content is available online. The internet has made access to information and communication far easier. Everyone with a computer and an internet connection web can access vast amounts of information.
This means, on one hand, that there are new opportunities for intellectual rightsholders to distribute their creations but, on the other hand, it also means that theses rightsholders tend to loose control over the exploitation of their rights.
Therefore, with the emergence of the Internet, intellectual property law and policy making have been challenged on many fronts.
For example, the simple notion of territoriality on a structure of clear physical boundaries is inconsistent with the internet. With clear boundaries, the State, as the creator and enforcer of intellectual property laws is clearly delineated.
The enforcement of intellectual property on the internet has become an important issue in our society. Most of our daily occupations revolve around the World Wide Web and it has become part of our way of living (we shop on the internet, we manage our bank account and share photos on this media).
This is why we have decided to analyze the different features of this issue.

Chapter I. Is intellectual property in its actual form able to support the innovative wave in the internet?
I. Existing legislation
There are some international treaties that deal with IP rights and the internet. One can give the example of the provision of the WTC about the so-called “Digital Agenda”. It covers the following issues: the rights applicable to the storage and transmission of works in digital systems, the limitations on and exceptions to rights in a digital environment, technological measures of protection and rights management information.
Some advancements have also been made by the European Union concerning IP and the internet. For example, directive 2004/48/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council of 29 April 2004 on the enforcement of intellectual property rights aims to create a level-playing field for applying IP rights. It also aims to harmonize EU countries’ legislation, thus ensuring that intellectual property enjoys an equivalent level of protection in the internal market.

II. Internet governance:
During the World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS) in 2005, internet governance was described as «the development and application by governments, the private sector and civil society, in their respective roles, of shared principles, norms, rules, decision making procedures, and programs that shape the evolution and use ».
This meant that all issues concerning the internet (including those of public policy) should evolve and be led in cooperation and collaboration with all stakeholders.
(Article 68 of the Tunis Agenda states « […] we also recognize the need for development of public policy by governments in consultation with all stakeholders of the Internet »)

Chapter II. Possible enforcement on the internet

I. Teach users about IP rights?
The internet is a place knowing constant evolution. When rights holders and authorities find a way to limit the infringement of IP rights committed, others will find new ways to distribute or infringe legislation protecting those rights. Thus an emphasis is to be placed on education of the users on those rights
Several propositions have been made by different actors, be it the European Commission or other IP related institutions, to create a special platform where users could legally access the content protected by IP rights. By setting what is legal and what is not, people will have a better view of what they can do on the internet without violating someone’s rights.

II. How to sue an user that violated an IP right?

The second issue, which directly concern the enforcement of IP rights, is about suing the one infringing IP rights on the internet. Because internet knows no geopolitical barriers, offenders are from anywhere in the world, where intellectual rights might be not be as protected as in other countries. Furthermore, the fact that the web is essentially a decentralized place makes it harder to identify the infringer. This brings us to the issue of determining which court has a jurisdiction to hear the complaints. Hence, the problem lies in the lack of a harmonized body of laws. Efforts should be made in drafting a special legislative protection of IP rights which will only be applicable on the internet. Such legislative document would be entirely dedicated to the internet and take into account all of its characteristics. Such issue might reveal itself of great importance in term of judicial security and will help rightsholders to know what their actual rights are and what they can do to protect them.

Another problem consist in the fact that, even if intermediaries, such has networks’ owner, have the obligation to delete any reported website committing an infringement against an IP right, they are not obliged to monitor their network in order to chase website committing such infringement. So, every years, millions of complains are filled and succeed at bringing down illegal website, but these website just have to reappear using another name in order to continue their infringement. Even if the content is as identical as the precedent website, rightsholders will have to launch another complain in order for the same website, with a different name, to be removed. We may ask ourselves, why not automatically strike down website which present an identical content as another who has been strike down? Even if the idea seem sweet and very time saving, it would be ignoring the principle of non bis in idem. So it seem to us that is it of utmost importance because it suck a humongous amount of energy and money in law suit and for almost nothing.

III. The internet and our private life.

But even if we have to greatly increase IP rights enforcement on the internet, it must not be in a way that will harm our right to privacy and our freedom of expression and our access to information. Several articles were also pointing that, too much monitoring and enforcement might, at the end of the day, be harmful to the creativity of people. Also, by monitoring too much in order to detect illegal content, we might come to a point where we will invade one’s privacy. So we need enough measures in order to actually protect intellectual creation, but we must keep in mind the other face of the problem, that we will be limiting people liberties of information and creation.

IV. Conclusion
As often, history has shown us that with any improvement comes backfires that need to deal with. Internet has revolutionized our lives in many ways but it need to be still tamed. That is why, for us daily users, the enforcement of IP rights on the internet is one of the most important issue of our time related to IP right because as we move toward a more fairly and just world, we should do the same concerning the internet which is a world that we have created.

Essay made by Meunier Adelice, Moller Hanna, Poucet Antoine, Yüksel Erdem, Rhalib Mehdi and Vandergheynst Alexis

The most important global IP related issue

Internet is everywhere, easily reachable, and it offers plenty of possibilities. It is a formidable tool for rightsholders, creating amazing distribution possibilities. On the other hand, it has become clear that we need to prevent infringements related or derived from its use. Indeed, what makes the strength of internet (accessibility, ease and speed of communication, reproduction and transmission of data) also makes it difficult for rightsholders to control the unauthorized exploitation of their rights. According to us, the protection of intellectual property rights in the “high-risk digital environment” seems to be one of the most important global IP related issue.

As young adult, we have grown up connected. Internet seems to be “ours” and we spend hours watching movies, downloading music, using pictures…regardless of their provenance. However, behind our screen, we never feel like thieves. Should we? Yes. The real problem, we believe, is that the consumer is not educated enough to understand the wrong he is doing. Someone who steals a disc in a music store is perceived far way worse than someone who listens to illegally downloaded music. “Users of the internet have been conditioned to believe that everything is free, as information, graphics, lyrics, source codes, and ideas are openly available for all to see and use”. This way of thinking must evolve through education (school, media…). We all have to understand that the protection accorded to intellectual property tends to “promote public availability of works that would otherwise not be shared with the public at large without a guarantee of the ability to protect them, and receive a return on the investment, time, effort and skill required for their production and distribution”.

Why is the issue of IP protection on internet so important for our society? In a certain way, internet is the sworn enemy of IP. Today, you need two “clic” on your keyboard to steal the work of someone else. But if we do not pay attention to IP, we may weaken the most beautiful way of communication ever created. People will be afraid to share their works, ideas and plans online. Government will have to take more and more measure to protect IP and the consumers will have a restricted access to free contents, less freedom online… Both rightsholders and consumers take the risk to lose something irreplaceable. By protecting IP, we protect internet.

Beside education, governments adopt policies to foster innovation and creativity on the Internet that include the protection of IPR. Both national and international instruments have been created to provide protection against infringement. For example, “the WCT and the WPPT (the “Internet treaties”) address the challenges posed by today’s digital technologies, in particular the dissemination of protected material over digital networks such as the Internet.

This leads to the second main issue we worked on: how to provide better regulations and effective enforcement of IPR over the internet while respecting the consumer privacy? Should the government have access to the contents of my computer on behalf of the protection of IP? Once again, it is about finding the right balance between the protections of different fundamental rights. It is a main issue to find a right equilibrium. What happens in case of interaction between IPR and data protection regulations when disclosure of personal data is requested for enforcement purpose? “Legislators and policy makers have always had to grapple with striking a balance between the rights of creators and the interests of users in the context of such new technological developments”.

Sources :
– http://www.interparty.org/intellectual-property-rights-on-the-internet.html
– http://www.londoninternational.ac.uk/sites/default/files/intellectual_property_internet.pdf

Generally, every Intellectual Property Rights deserve to be protected. When you create something on your own, you have the right to a protection. You put efforts and all your energy on it and it would be unfair not being granted any protection… It’s about ownership and in a world like ours, it is normal to prevent ourselves from people desperate for money and glory and who would be ready to do anything just to steal others creations. Every creation deserves to be acknowledged and specially attributed to its creator.
Also, in the end, every creation is a sort of contribution to the society and helps it to evolve.
But according to me, the focus must be specially put on the patents. The patent consist for the government to grant protection to the “author” of a new invention in exchange of the informations on this invention. Those kind of creations must be particularly protected, according to me, because, those are revolutionary for the society. The inventions help us in a great way to have less and less difficulties in our life and to evolve faster and faster. Unfortunately, it’s worsening the environment, specifically the climate so an invention can be seen like a poisoned chalice…
The patents have many advantages:
First, they are a way to push the inventor to reveal to the world what it is about to become revolutionary for the society… The value we focus on here, is the generosity and the solidarity…
Then, the inventor by sharing his invention has everything to win by asking for a patent. It grants him a protection, and he will not be powerless if someone tries to steal it or to take all the merits for it. The patent can be seen as an exchange of good practices because it protects the inventor and the inventor accepts to share it with the society and to contribute to make the society evolve. But that’s not all because the inventor wins respect and a recognition of his invention… Also a reward for it.

Students: Lorena Weyckmans, Edouard Malcourant, Santiago Morales Pacheco and Guillaume Brisbois

The ICC roadmap points out an Intellectual Property Right (IPR) issue that we believe to be major in our society: the competition issue. It seems only natural and logical that areas like competition law (called antitrust in U.S.), that promotes or seeks to maintain market competition by regulating anti-competitive conduct by companies, and IP law which is the property of an individual or a firm on its own intellectual creation establishing therefore a monopoly. Law makers are thus facing a long-term trade-off between the property right and market competition as IPR can prevent competition and establish monopoly. We have seen that an international agreement called TRIPS took measures for WTO members allowing them to control anti-competitive practices based on IPR. Many international organizations like WTO have set up groups to study such practices but the major activity has been at national or EU level.

The “anti-competitivity” of IP can be seen in three distinct ways. First of all, the owner of an IP can abuse his dominant as Martin Shkreli, a pharmaceuticals CEO, did by raising the HIV medication price by 5,000%. This was a huge media drama, we believe U.S. should start considering applying a standstill effect as it is a pity research made marvelous advances to treat AIDS and we are going backwards in the access to medical treatments for the sake of a property right. Also, a licensor – the owner of the IP – has the possibility to impose restrictive terms on his licensee – competitors willing to sell his IP – to secure inappropriate reward for his IP (this is called “tying”) like by setting a minimum price. We could illustrate this with the case of Microsoft imposing the use of Internet Explorer when buying Windows 98 which was condemned for illegal tying. Finally, the “anti-competitivity” of IP can be seen through competitor’s behavior depending on the certainty and the “punitivuty” of the law protecting the patent, meaning the level of protection of patents may make competitors respect it or challenge it. This was illustrated when Samsung decided to challenge several Apple patents to produce their Galaxy phones, they had much more benefits to make producing them anyway, challenging the law and paying “only” $120 millions of dollars of damages to Apple.
About these three ways of expression of the competition issue, the United States and the European Commission have adopted very different reactions and positions. While U.S. authorities showed themselves to be flexible and relaxed by considering that intellectual property rights only rarely create monopolies in the antitrust sense, refusing to share your property not being a violation of the law; the European Commission has long promoted the compulsory licensing of IPR in special market situations. Therefore they condemned Microsoft for not releasing technical information to block innovation by competitors and threatened to attack the pharmaceutical industry for using “defensive patents”, meaning changing minor thing in the IP to benefits from a new patent, a practice that discourages relevant innovative efforts.

Also, while U.S. adopted a “rule of reason” to analyze the balance between the pro-competitive benefits and the anti-competitive effects therefore making permissible tying and setting a minimum price as it could be a solution to the free-rider problem. The European Commission granted block exemptions to specified classes of agreements like research, development or technology transfer and issued guidelines for the residual agreements. This system of regulation has shown to be ineffective as large companies have no direct use of it because of its uncertainty and restrictions barring it. The EU showed to be less generous than US by considering that no conceivable circumstances of tying or setting a minimum price could satisfy the conditions necessary for it to be lawful.
About the level of protection of patents, a new Act came into force in U.S. to improve the relevant weaknesses in US patent law (notably by reducing uncertainty on validity compared with the former and very outrageous “first-to-invent” law and also by improving the opportunities for third-party attack on patents).

The recent legislative evolutions in both U.S. and EU show that neither of the two “systems” are effective or better than the other and there is still a lot to achieve. Improvement is needed but the choice of authorities in the competition-IP trade-off clearly depends on each society’s culture and the level of attachment they have to property. Authorities seem to start realizing too much IP protection prevents competition and shaken the economic equilibrium by creating monopolies while favoring competition slows down private investment in research.

Using term of economy is the only way to describe the issue between IPR and competition: trade-off, choice, equilibrium, competitor’s behavior. This explains why we will never achieve completely both of them and if we do achieve completely one of them it would be at the expense of the other. Our world society is conditioned by economy which is the reason why the choice authorities make in the trade-off IPR-competition will influence everyone’s routine. We may not all be creators of innovative computers or revolutionary medicines but we are all influenced by the accessibility of technology, medical treatments or cars. The disputes or cartels made by giants change our lives whether we want it or not.
This issue between commerce and property raises ethical questions about the necessity of competition for fair business but also the relativity of an individual’s property. But also and more concretely the access to medicines or treatments that might be blocked by patents. We must relativize how firms like Nivea hire and pay people to make research for this new Q10 molecule in their products protected by a patent that in the end is going to pollute our running water making our government paying to put antibiotics in it. It is a vicious circle and the societal impact of the run, not after innovation, but after money has to be regulated by law.

Of course some firms do have an exemplary behavior like the Swiss-firm Lifestraw that invented a straw able to filter water for drinking. The item is distributed for free or at low prices to NGOs to give them away in less-developed countries or to handle humanitarian crisis while developed countries have to pay a high price to obtain it. This right to discrimination on the market due to the IP on Lifestraw is perceived as a smart way to handle IP, but again this is a monopoly.

NGOs often complain about this IP protection on medication that could be sold at lower prices to facilitate the access to medicines in developing countries. The pharmaceutical world is known and unpopular for the intellectual properties it generates. Some movements point out how vaccines are overestimated and used to make profits, we believe we should relativize this demonization of vaccines while keeping in mind that some vaccines like flu vaccines that are different every year are clearly generating more financial profits than societal profits.

We could ask ourselves what would be the right thing to do if a firm develops a GMO kind of wheat that may grow in harsh conditions. Where does their property rights stop? Is it their proper right to refuse to distribute it to less-developed African countries that desperately need food in some crisis?

The limit between smart thinking and the conspiracy theory is thin as a society that is dictated by economy and profits paradoxically demonizes patents and monopolies. The debate on this issue could go on a long time as examples are flourishing every day.

JUSTIFICATION OF THE PERSONALLY PERCEIVED IMPORTANCE OF THE INTERACTION BETWEEN INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY AND INNOVATION
First, I wish to express how profoundly ill-informed I consider myself to be at this point in time, concerning the substantial aspect of this topic, basing my personal point of view exclusively on my comprehension of the ICC intellectual property roadmap 2012.

I have chosen innovation as the most important, in my point of view, of the five presented aspects of interaction between intellectual property and other policy areas. I believe innovation is something that transcends this division, or rather, is englobed by other options, such as environmental protection or sustainable economic development, being an integral element of both.
Since time immemorial, innovation presents itself as one of the fundamental traits of human existence- from the invention of the wheel to the development of the computer on which I’m typing this text, innovation has allowed for exponential growth of our knowledge and the improvement of the human condition. In my view, it is precisely in the exponential character of it’s contribution to human development, that innovation takes on its’ full force. Let’s try and imagine, for a second, that the invention of the wheel had been the object of rigorous IPR protection, requiring licencing for any application other than by its’ inventor. As absurd as the idea might seem, it isn’t difficult to imagine that in such a situation, the invention of at least partially derived ideas, such as the horse carriage, the tire and all the way to the modern automobile, would have been rendered significantly more difficult. I say this to show that, in my view, the true value of an invention doesn’t necessarily reside in the invented object itself, but rather in the platform the object provides for further development and innovation.
On the other hand, the comparison of the modern IPR situation with the invention of the wheel seems grossly inaccurate if not deceptive. In a world of increasingly complex technology, taking innovation a step further often entails extremely high R&D costs, currently supported in their vast majority by the private sector. Paradoxically, the conscience of the importance of such innovation for public welfare might lead to policies limiting or restricting the access of that same public to the use of these innovations, in an attempt to ensure the incentive for the private sector for continued investment in research and development. I fear such a reasoning might however lack scrupule, especially when the IPR in question touch some of the more sensitive questions presented by our modern society. To illustrate, pharmaceutical companies like to refer to the costs of R&D as justification of the sometimes exorbitant prices of medication they supply. This often leads to extremely difficult situations, where personal wealth determines an individuals’ right to treatment. Perhaps, in sensitive areas of application such as medicine, a government imposed price top-up system, taking into consideration the invested capital and a reasonable amount of profit spread over the period of patent protection before prolongation is required should be considered. This, as opposed to the general philosophy of loosening regulation in the shape of tax incentives and “regulation favouring investment and trade”, which despite its’ obvious pitfalls, still appears to be the way to go when it comes to building local innovative capacity.

Having participated at several events on this topic, mostly organized by the European Young Innovators’ Forum, reccuring questions seemed to pop up at every one of them. These ranged from difficulties with obtaining patent recognition and protection in different jurisdictions and the costs inherent to such activity (apparently it can take as much as three years and legal fees sometimes close to 50000 EUR), to innovation being inhibited in its’ transatlantic perspective by relatively strict regulation (currently, it appears there is no possibility for EU based users/companies to pursue US based companies before US courts, however H.E. A. Gardner has indicated this would be part of Safe Harbor 2.0.).
If 50,000 EUR of legal fees doesn’t seem like an exagerrated sum of money for big, international corporations, it is important to remind ourselves that some of the most active segments of the economy that invest in innovation are start-ups. Granted, their innovation isn’t likely to reside in the realm of pharmacological means or other high-cost sectors, however their sheer number and the innovative spirit often possessed by these entrepreneurs make them an innovative force to be reckoned with. It would appear that when it comes to protecting intellectual property, the first problem for a start-upper will present itself when he attempts a pitch to obtain venture capital. As start-ups are often based on little more than an idea (which itself cannot be subject to IP protection), presenting that idea to potential investors invariably involves revealing it in its’ entirety. This was one of the fundamental questions we attempted to address at the Unconvention 2015, with experts from law firms such as Jag Shaw Baker (London and New York based), Commissionner Gunther Oettinger, H.E. Anthony Gardner, Benjamin Rooney and others. It became apparent that the only viable way for a start-upper to ensure security of the idea was a non-disclosure agreement, which investors are highly unlikely to sign. Thankfully, trust is, despite evidence to the contrary, still an important part of such interaction, which means investors are unlikely to steal ideas, in an effort to protect their image. Legally, however, this doesn’t appear as satisfactory protection, especially in an economic environment where the creation of jobs is largely based on supporting and subsidizing entrepreneurs to create their own employment, and later provide it to others as well.

All this goes to show that this is indeed a pertinent topic to discuss, one I find to be the most pertinent of all of the options considered in the text.

The environmental protection will certainly be one of the biggest issue of this decade. Actually, the big meeting of the United Nation wich will take place in Paris during the begining of december, the so-called COP21, reveals how important became the environmental issue. Step by step people begin to understand the interest we have to protect our Earth, the biodiversity and how to use our ressources in a sustainable way.

The International Chamber of Commerce highlights the important role of intellectual property. The ICC hopes that the intellectual property will be a benefic tool and will enable the economic world to transit to a « green economy ». The organisation continues to provide critical feedback to governments and IGO’s on the role of IPR and encourage them for green growth and environmental taxation.

The world community has showed his willingness and his interest to conserve biodiversity, to promote its sustainable use and to share fairly the benefit of this use through different treaties. One of the most important is the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) which recognizes the sovereignity of member countries over genetic ressources found within their boundaries, and sets out principles upon which acces to genetic ressources is to be provided. Even if the CBD was signed in 1992, some parts of his content had not been passed through law and in fact produced no effect. However, in October 2010, the Nagoya protocol concluded a new deal in term of environment in order to achieve the goal of the CBD. Those two legal texts are essential to set out the principles of access and benefit-sharing requirements but also to improve the access to the genetic ressources.

An innovative way which combines economy and IPL is the pollution permit aimed at reducing pollution. As long as it can sound akward, pollution permit is economic way to reduce pollution’s emission and encourage firm to invest in « greener » technology. It provides an economic incencitives for achieving reductions on the emmisions of pollutants. A central authority (usually a governmental body) sets a limit on the amount of a pollutant that may be emitted by a firm. If an company wants to pollute more, it would have to buy pollution permit to an another one. The selling’s company will have more money to invest in technology that reduce his emmissions and it will give an incentive for this company to pollute less in order to sell his other pollution permits. This market-based approach is way for governmental body to control the market of pollution and to influence firms to devellop new way of producing with less emmissions of pollutants.

Even if the innovation, the information society and others matters are fundamental, we think that the question of the environment is more important because it’s has been a key question often hides by the superpower of this world. China and the US are the biggest polluter in this world. They show a lot of ressistance to reduce polltion because of the economic issue. For instance, the US hasn’t signed the CBD yet. The world community has to put any kind of pressure on the superpower to push them on the right way. It has been unarguable that if we keep going in that direction, the blue planet will one day not be habitable. We think that gouvernments and international bodies must show a stronger involvement and policy towards polluter. They have to support, as much as they can, clean technology innovation and ensure that the private sector follow all the rules in term of environment. Despite the fact that they are no single international court which is dedicated solely to environmental issues, a series of international judicial bodies exist for the settlement of international environmental disputes. However, despite the number of available venues, it is unclear whether these institutions are capable of fulfilling the role required by the different treaties and conventions.

The UN has to create an independant judicial bodies which only deal with envirnmental issues and make sure that governments and the private sector comply with its decision.

Cesar Hoed
Domenico Zinga
Arthur Meeus

In our paper, we decided to address the topic of climate change and its link with intellectual property rights (IPRs). As a matter of fact, we chose climate change because we consider it to be a current and global issue, that has an impact on all countries and that gathers many issues. More precisely, we analyzed issues and solutions advanced by different NGOs’ and some international organizations.

In a world ruled by capitalism, producing more, faster, and increasing benefits is the rule. In this context, the impact of the actual economic system on climate change cannot be denied. The countries cannot continue to produce without considering this environmental impact of their activities. In spite of international declarations (as Rio declaration), protocols (as Nagoya Protocol), regulations in order to preserve environment and to reduce pollution, the climate continues to worsen. As a consequence, countries and businesses have to work together; both public and private sectors have to cooperate in order to improve the situation.

A solution to ensure a sustainable development and to try to stem the climate change would be to change to an economic system based on fair trade. Some NGOs like Oxfam promote it. The guidelines of this system are for example: enforcement of international and national law, reduction of the use of pesticide and fertilizer, encouragement of raw materials use, reduction of production waste and of their environmental impact, support of local productions, the grant of wage to workers, improvement of the working conditions, etc.

Fair trade would be a way of putting together the public and the private sectors, states and businesses, in order to work together in a common project of economic development that is respectful of the environment and of the citizens. It would be a way to strengthen partnership between developed countries and less developed countries. It would ensure a better environmental protection, put the accent on the social dimension in the economic development, promote local production and domestic market while maintaining a global marketplace, reduce cost in investments which would be shared between public and private sectors, promote and aid innovations, etc.

In addition, it would foster partner states to enact a legal framework including IPRs in order to promote innovations, facilitate cooperation between different actors and make easier deployment and dissemination of new technologies resulting of the partnership.

The importance of IPRs in enabling technological transfer is also displayed when it comes to the development of solutions to reduce CO2 emissions. By a way of illustration, Greenpeace believes that South Africa is in a strong position to influence the fight against climate change as a symbol of African power. She is also a member invited to the G8. South Africa emits a lot CO2 in Africa coming from coal production. The government plans to restore old coal plants and to build more and more plants each year. The leaders also want to build new nuclear plants. Greenpeace calls for a reduction in global emissions as soon as possible.
Moreover, the association promotes a significant reduction in our dependence on fossil fuels, particularly coal, with the adoption of an energy revolution. Indeed, Greenpeace set up governmental objectives and an ambitious timetable. Although Africa doesn’t contribute to climate change, since they emit few CO2, Africa suffers heavily from the effects of this climate change. This causes either droughts or floods, with a detrimental effect on crops and resources.

While developed countries debate on what could cause climate change in the near future, it already threatens the most vulnerable populations on the planet. In that perspective, IPRs’ importance is growing. Again, technology transfers to developing countries could reduce the adverse effects of climate change. Indeed, with these new technologies, Africa could launch a form of “energy revolution”, decreasing global emissions and relieving part of the African population which is suffering from climate change.

As it was pointed out, climate change has a huge impact nowadays and creates many issues. Consequently, it becomes more than necessary to develop new, green technologies and disseminate them to where they are needed.

Nonetheless, the research and development of such climate friendly technologies requires a lot of investments, and that is why it is essential to create incentives for private companies to make those investments. The World Trade Organization (WTO) established an Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS); it contains plenty of provisions regarding climate change. These provisions concern patents, trade secrets, licensing of practices which restrain competition, other forms of IPRs such as trademarks and the suppression of unfair competition, etc.

The WTO sees this agreement as a way of promoting technological innovation. Indeed, businesses need and demand clear and predictable policies and regulations regarding intellectual property, before investing in projects about developing green technologies. They consider that intellectual property really plays a role in helping to create technological partnerships, and combine different green technologies coming from several sources.
However, the TRIPS agreement also contains a number of flexibilities. Those flexibilities allow governments to relax certain obligations of intellectual property protection, under some conditions. Developing countries are more than happy with these flexibilities, because they are a huge help for them in the access to green technology. Thus, flexibilities are a good way of disseminating new technologies, especially in the countries where they are needed the most. But not everyone has a positive view on this. Some NGO’s, among other actors, believe that IPRs flexibilities will not promote innovation, because they make investments more difficult and less predictable.

However, despite these legal efforts to promote innovations and technology transfers, some troubles remain. As a matter of fact, the NGO Third World Network (TWN) and the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) both point out the existence of a gap between this seemingly appropriate legal framework and the lack of local capacity to fully profit from it. Indeed, developing countries are often blocked at a stage where they have to import a lot of materials. Consequently, they still have to face high costs related to the use of patented creations or the buying of expensive licenses. Also, the OECD indicates that, while flexibilities might be positive, the modality of compulsory license, for instance, would not benefit in the long run since the know-how is unlikely to be transferred in this case. Thus, this highlights the deficit of means available at the local level to allow technology growth. Therefore, the OECD advocates solutions alternative to IPRs changes, such as local financial aids.

Another solution, mentioned by TWN, is the development of unpatented eco-friendly technologies or the development of technologies that would belong to the public domain. In that hypothesis, one would definitely have decided that the climate change issue supersedes the various commercial interests at stake.

To sum up, in accordance to what the RoadMap of the ICC set forth, there is a partnership between private and public actors to develop a legal framework which ensures enough stability for private investments. Therefore, public actors, should be encouraged to invest more in IPRs. To conclude, one could say that IPRs foster innovations as well as the diffusion of new technologies in developing countries, helping to fight back climate change.

As stated by the WIPO: “IP is protected in law by, for example, patents, copyright and trademarks which enable people to earn recognition or financial benefit from what they invent or create. By striking the right balance between the interests of innovators and the wider public interest, the IP system aims to foster an environment in which creativity and innovation can flourish”.

The current landscape in the field of innovation is possible thanks to IPR. They simulate investment and cooperation.

After a furnished reading on the different areas of deployment of IP rights, our group came to the conclusion that the sector of Innovation was the most interesting one to discuss. Indeed, inovation typically requires substantial investment in education, research and development, and labor to bring a new idea to the marketplace. If others can steal the idea once it is proven, undermining the creator’s ability to recoup the cost of his or her innovative investment, the incentive to innovate is reduced. Innovation is, furthermore, a sector that is essential to and that cannot be excluded from the other areas developped in the readings.

In this paper, we will hence argue our choice by, first, developping the link between IPR and the economy to, then, be able to develop the one between IPR and Innovation and, finally, the one between IPR and the environment.

Nowadays with the globalization of our economy, the assembly and manufacturing are made in numerous countries through the world.

This process “creates value chains that generate huge flows of capital”. This means that a lot of people working and representing different entities work together in order to achieve something. Taking this into account, a question needs to be asked: can a mere trust between people makes this all system work and ensure its prosperity?

Actually in a era in which the link phenomenon becomes increasingly common, IPRs constitute an incentive for private sector to innovate. Moreover technology must be seen as a major element in sustainable economic development. In fact, if economic actors know that they will benefit a protection because of IPRs they won’t fear to work with other people and they would probably more easily participate to the global economy.

Problems arise then because each country has its own IPRs system. So there is clearly a need to harmonize IPRs for the wealth of the market. In order to ensure a great economic development governments must initiate this process. IPRs are a key component of foreign investment, partnership and international trade, permitting a “secured” sharing of knowledge that leads to the increase in development of local industries.

The idea here is that all this participates to the globalization improvement both economically and technologically speaking since IPRs are incentives to contribute to a well functioning economy because of ensured pay-back for investment and to fluent exchange because of protected open-innovation.

Despite the broad consensus that innovation is central to the long-run performance of an economy, there is no consensus on the issue of competition and innovation in IPRs protection. We should wonder to what extent and in what form should the IPRs of the innovators be ? Furthermore, should IPRs policy be coupled with antitrust laws and used to limit the monopoly power of technology leaders ?

As a matter of fact, we can see that in most industries a distinction needs to be drawn between “leaders” and “followers” companies. Indeed, the issue about competition and innovation rely on the fact that IPRs are protected differently depending on how technologically significant is the company.

To this end, a powerful effect appears in this competition’s interactions between leaders and followers, called the trickle-down effect, providing greater protection to firms that are further ahead of their followers. A step-by-step competition permitting so-called followers companies to copy or to use the leaders technologies would be particularly beneficial in industries where there is a large technology gap between leaders and followers.

This trickle-down effect could seem unfair prima facie, nevertheless when we look at it more conscientiously, we see that this effect implies that even if we give more IPRs protection to companies with indicative dynamically leads over their rivals, it also dynamically incentives companies with more limited technological leads. In plus, innovation will increase their productivity and will grant them additional IPRs protections.

The solution, in our opinion, is to thus introduce an optimal IPR policy that should be state-dependent and provide greater protection to companies with significant technological leads and only IPRs protection for those without.

Finally, another IP-related issue, the environmental protection also needs innovation. Governments should place this issue at the top of their to-do list. Indeed, biological diversity and climate change should be increasingly taken into account.
Moreover, the protection of the environment cannot increase without innovation: new technologies have indeed to be found.

Firstly, animal and vegetal species are increasingly disappearing, which is bad for the environment. Innovating in biotechnologies could enable to conserve biodiversity and to create new living organisms.

But also, our environment is threatened by pollution. The overall global warming and climate changes are direct consequences of this pollution. Engineers should be incited to invent new technologies still powerful but less polluting. In order to do so, innovation is capital. And Intellectual Property Rights inhibit the process of innovation by giving certainty and assuring return for those who invest in innovation.

Our group decided to focus on the relation between the environmental protection and IP rights, specifically patents.

The relationship between the environmental protection and inventions’ protection is often argued over. The reason being is that we are sometimes faced with the dilemma of protecting the environment or technological innovations.

However, a new idea reconciles these two objectives: since a biotechnological invention was developed from genetic resources, the patent application should disclose the geographical origin of those resources. In fact, the objects of the Convention on Biological diversity are :

1. to conserve biodiversity,
2. to promote its sustainable use, and
3. To share fairly the benefits of this use.

The third objective reflects a delicate compromise between genetic contributing to countries, and the countries users of such resources, rich in biotechnology.

Previously, under international law, genetic resources fell within the common heritage of humanity and their users enjoyed relatively free access. Now, the CBD recognizes the sovereignty of member countries over genetic resources found within their boundaries, and sets out principles upon which access to genetic resources is to be provided.

In 2002, parties to the CBD urged “governments to encourage the disclosure of the origin’s country of genetic resources in application for IPR (…)”. This way, providers of genetic resources could easily carry on monitoring transfers of genetic resources and identify offenders.

So one must ask: does the prerequisite to declare the origin of genetic resources to acquire a patent can meet the third objective of the CBD? In other words, the fair and equitable sharing of benefits arising from the utilization of this Convention?

Environmental protection is not the primary function of the patent system, but to stimulate innovation. Nevertheless, patent could be used as a mean to ensure the effectiveness of the CBD.

However, some fear the origin’s mandatory disclosures of genetic resources because it could results in additional costs for businesses. For example, if the cost to obtain patents increases, businesses might choose to protect inventions by trade secrets. Therefore, the obligation to disclose the origin would result in a reduction in the transparency of the process of research and development, which would be contrary to the objective sought. However, this seems unlikely for the following two reasons:

1. The cost related to the disclosure is likely to be low since it’s usually simple and factual scientific information, even necessary to describe the invention.

2. The capacity of imitation is high in this area; business remains highly dependent on the patent system to protect their inventions.

In overall, the origin’s disclosure could facilitate the monitoring of transfers of genetic resources and contribute to achieving the objective of benefit –sharing. This solution is limited by users’ ability to identify the genetic resources’ origin and the ability of providers to carefully analyse all patent applications. Nevertheless, it would be a significant step into a cooperative approach between both providers and users of genetic resources, whose symbolic value be as important as benefit sharing would arise.

Innovation :

1. Background of the issue

The intellectual property right related issue which appears to be the most important and relevant one to speak about today is that of innovation, as pointed out in the ICC 2014 Roadmap.
Researches made by the ICC commissions pointed out that IP is actually used in innovative processes as a mean to help policy makers design IP.

We must start by saying that the current marketplace is an ever-evolving one in which companies tend to come along with innovating ideas that they resort to in order to solve societal issues whether they are linked to health, environment, job creation, and education as well as food security. The availability of those innovations – understood as solutions to the problems we listed – depends on both the development and diffusion of existing and new technologies.

Therefore, new products, services and technologies are more and more created. Yet one ought to bear in mind that those novelties require a heightened protection of stakeholders’ rights. In such an innovating process, it is inevitable that disloyal competition, counterfeits, and piracy will take place and that enforcement on the Internet will become a major issue for harmed companies that are thus asking for stricter policies and protection, as will be discussed later in this note.

2. Considering stakeholders’ point of view

A. Businesses

Businesses and companies work for a purpose, which is to maximize profit in the most efficient way. Therefore they constantly need to provide markets with new products and services.

In addition to that, they have a huge interest in meeting the needs of emerging and developing countries : the application of technology and innovation consists of a critical resource which can generate significant development benefits. That is the reason why not only developing states governments but also private actors collaborate with companies. One way to uphold the benefits of a strong IPR protection is pointing out the lack of recognition suffered by IPR in certain countries, most notably in developing countries.

In order to achieve their goals, companies resort to a form of networked innovation known as “open innovation”, which amounts for the companies to share ideas and collaborate with partners and even competitors for they consider it to be the most appropriate path to embrace.

One could think that such collaboration could lead to disloyal competition since a collaboration between firms that were initially able to share knowledge and new concepts might end up into a dispute caused by one party infringing on the rights of the other. That is the reason why a robust and well-conceived IP protection fosters good conditions for different entities to work hand in hand by providing certainty and predictability.

IPR can thus be seen as critical tools that help reassure companies after they have invested large amounts of money in innovational products thanks to the protection they will grant them : that will help them amortizing investments as well as ensuring a return to shareholders.
As said, innovations and new technologies are a challenge for companies with regard to the control of production, it’s illicit distribution and brand using. Given the current state of affairs, it is no easy enterprise to have an utmost control when firms produce new goods, especially by reason of an increase in counterfeits and piracy.

B. Civilians and private actors

As seen in the previous section, it is now common knowledge that some companies infringe on other companies’ rights by producing counterfeits, and do so using deficient and inappropriate material. The items aren’t subject to the same quality control and do not transit via the same distribution channels. People’s awareness must be arose when it comes to buying counterfeits and not original products such as medicines, toys, car or airplane parts because they represent a considerable threat to their health, despite the advantage they represent from a financial point of view.
All in all, there is way more sanction than prevention in the field of innovation, which is why we suggest people to be better informed on the law as well as on the risks they incur.

Moreover, we can also consider civilians as potential business owner willing to enter on the market with innovating ideas. As already explained, innovations and new technologies will soon reign supreme, if they don’t already do. Their widespread on markets is such that it dissuades potential business owners and restrains their possibility to provide markets with ideas that are completely innovating, since there are already so many of them.

Nevertheless, we can’t deny the importance for creators to be granted the adequate legal protection, for the contrary would limit the occurrence of innovations. Society would suffer as a result, as claimed by the Incentive theory.

C. Governments

As previously said, governments have strong interests in providing companies with well-conceived IPR protection. Indeed if the latter feel comfortable and secured enough thanks to the legal frame their production will benefit from, they will keep innovating and launching. This new type of production is likely to generate a collateral job creation on the market since there will be a need for the specialization and ideas of experts or freshly graduated people that can best understand and work with new technologies.
There will thus be less unemployment that governments would have had to support plus it can favors foreign direct investment in innovating companies.

We finally noticed that governments along with academics can intervene in the area of basic research. The problem is that the commercialization of their discoveries requires consequent investments of private capital so a solution to this issue lies in the transfer of patents or the licensing of patents and related know-how to the private sector.

It seems that the impact of intellectual property on innovation is by far the most noticeable.
From Watts’s steam engine to modern mobile data technology, innovation has always had an extraordinary impact on society. Watts’s steam engine allowed the boom of the industrial revolution. Mobile data, on the other hand, allows on a daily basis tens of millions of people across the world to access basic services, such as banking services and information-communication services. These two stepping stones in human technological advancement were able to happen thanks to intellectual property rights, the legal protection it creates and the stability that derives from it.
Not only do intellectual property rights permit the correct environment for innovation but they allow the creation of chains of information sharing. One smaller, more specialised company can create a part that will then be added on to, or else used in something bigger. Simply put, intellectual property rights protect smaller companies from disloyal competition from their bigger, more diversified counterparts. IPRs allow all companies contributing to R&D to have their work respected and their effort duly compensated.
One important impact of IPRs on innovation is the enabling of “open innovation”, in other words when different, sometimes opposing, groups work together or at least use one and others work for further innovation. Intellectual property law allows the perfect compromise between commercialisation and technological advancement. One company can reap the economic benefits of developing a new technology while that innovation is accessible for others to continue innovating. It creates an environment that encourages innovation while not blocking its advancement in intellectual property monopolies.
The importance of IPR as a means to ensure effective stimulation and best allocation of Innovation can be highlighted when compared to Government-based initiatives such as compulsory licensing policies. Such policies undermine access to further innovation because foreign companies are discouraged from seeking valuable, sustainable partnerships in that jurisdiction.
One of the benefits that stem from creating an environment that better accommodates the protection of IP Rights is the creation of an educated workforce. An environment that stimulates innovation will nurture a more talented workforce, which in turn will provide an added-value to society as a whole.

Alexander Cicic, Adam Saafi

Climate change is, for us, one of the most important global Intellectual Property-related issue. Actually, we are all concerned about this phenomenon and the development of the technology plays an important role in order to reduce the negative consequences of the climate change. Intellectual Property has a direct influence on technology and can contribute to mitigate this threat. Furthermore, non-governmental organizations (NGO) such as OXFAM or WWF take action to answer climate change.

Doctors Without Borders are very concerned with intellectual property law. Indeed, they took position on access to medicines in India (http://www.doctorswithoutborders.org/…/indias-access-medici…) about the relationship between intellectual property rules and access to medicines. At this moment, they are trying to gut patent rights in the Trans-Pacific Partnership Agreement defending the idea that patents “would give pharmaceutical companies longer monopolies over brand name drugs”(http://www.doctorswithoutborders.org/help-us-fix-tpp) and that pharmaceutical companies want to keep medicines prices as high as possible. See the campaign on Twitter, hashtag ‪#‎BadDealforMedicine‬.

MSF is not really involved in climate change issues. But we could surely make a parallel between the resources needed to deal with pandemics and those who will be needed to deal with future climate change. These are indeed, analysts said the poorest countries will be most affected. We must therefore be careful not to see repeated the same kind of situation as patents and pharmaceutical companies.

Greenpeace is a pacific NGO that have for purpose to fight for the environmental protection at any level : protection of animal species, fight against climate change, protection of ground and water,…

Greenpeace use different method to achieve its goal, The NGO implement activism to advertise people of the biggest environmental problems and, thereby, forcing governments and companies to adapt their environmental practices. At the same time, to get change in a more diplomatic way, Greenpeace act also as a lobby.
The organization support treaty-making about environmental defense and climate change as Kyoto protocol, entered in force in 1994 and are fighting for CO2 emissions dismissing. The NGO also plays a role in the ecological expertise: a lot of investigations about environment and climate change are making by Greenpeace.

An important place is according to the IPR (patents in particular) in this kind of treaty because it provides a support to private sector investment to developing new “clean” technologies. This is the case of ADP (Durban platform for enhanced action) established under Kyoto protocol and hallowing IPR protection. This is an effective way to encourage companies to be cleaner and so support emissions reductions.

Oxfam is one of those organizations, which induce governments around the world to fight against climate change because of the various consequences that this phenomenon causes (poverty, hunger, drought and floods). In fact we forget too often it is the poorest people who are particularly affected by global warming, while they are the least responsible, because they do not have the financial and technical resources to adapt. Oxfam plays a vital role in this regard by encouraging the various authorities and politicians to reduce emissions of greenhouse gases and promote sustainable energy resources. And so it is here that the question of intellectual property rights come into play because they have a great impact on the way technologies are transferred to developing countries. It appears, in fact, very important in the 21st century that intellectual property is able to give an answer to climate change. In this case, it is primarily the development and dissemination of new technologies that aim to reduce greenhouse gas emissions or allow people to adapt the changement occurred by climate change. Oxfam is very interested in the fight against global warming and aims to ensure that intellectual property rights can always allow the apparition of new technologies in developing countries.

Intellectual property rights are important in the climat change landscape because it’s a global problem, which requires new and very sharp technological solutions. Every organization, public or private, should or is investing in research to obtain results in its own area of concern.

We will now talk about World Wildlife Fund (WWF). It’s a non-governmental organization, which is mainly focused on the conservation of nature, which impact them directly. WWF working policy is more organized on the basis of both collaboration and dialogue.

The global support from different stakeholders to innovation, and therefore research and finances, is essential. To help the organization, such as WWF, to develop and improve new technologies with the aim of reducing at maximum the catastrophic impact on the global climat, they need their researches to result on registering new patents, licenses… This will help them to reach their goals. The intellectual property rights that cover those patents are facilitating and validating the exchange of the new technologies and this will fit into the legal and political environment established by the working policy of WWF. As a matter of fact, as mention earlier, collaboration is WWF way of working to reach their objectives.

In conclusion, climate change can have dramatic consequences on the world. Some initiatives should be taken by governments to support private sector investments.
As mentioned before, climate change affects mostly the least developed countries, although they are not necessarily the most responsible.
The world needs a better long-term policy that will meet the needs of countries according to their situation. That’s why the UNFCCC is one of the pillars of climate change policy because it allows the discussion and the negotiations of solutions.

1) Competition

Tensions naturally exist between competition law and Intellectual Property Rights (IPR). Trade Related Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS) Articles 8.2 and 40 allow World Trade Organization (WTO) members to adopt measures to control anti-competitive practices based on IPR. But, What happend. What about “Chinese market”. Firstly, according to me, what appears to be the most important global IP-related issue are the continuous IP violations perpetrated by a black list of emergent economies which includes China, Turquey, Rusia, Argentina…, and not only refering to IP breaches made by companies located on industrial cities who make it´s own national economy flow, but also about the enviromental worry western countries can´t get to control in the so closed excommunist country. But what I am really interested in is China. The first country in popullation, currently a military and economy superpower (having bougth a great part of the US debt, which makes it untouchable) and still needing from others to grow. Isn´t that the definition of a “growing economy”?

From a economic and political point of view, government of the IP responds to the interests and demands from a small group of industrialized countries with enough power to dictate the game´s rules in comercial matters. However, a right Reading of the TRIPS shows us that, in last instance, the Agreement looks for a conciliation between developed and developing countries.

Talking about IP rights and China seems to be a joke, and why is that? You must know for sure that many companies located in China make their living by copying everything you can get to imagine, from phones to intimate clothes, tv’s and even medicines copies, and that would not be happening if no one was buying the goods, but someone does, and, at the end of the chain, you do one way or another.

In Spain, where I come from, we have these all-cheap stores mostly haunted by chinese people where you can buy for example a bad copy of Adidas called “Adidos” and stuff like that, and you may be asking yourself why is this girl saying that? Does it have anything to do with economy? Unfortunately yes, it does have a lot to do with economy, because those stores we have talking about are the only ones that, in the whole year, have an economic stability even though buyers know the fact that they are selling products illegally copied, which is a crime and therefore, makes them criminals too.

2) Another important issue

Another issue we need to talk about is about the environment. In the last decades, discussions about the effects of trade on environment in economical, social, political and legal sectors have been multiplied. In the legal scope, “biotrade” stress was came about specially between contemporary environmental and commercial treated. Stress between environment and trade are caused by two lacks on environmental policy: a) the economical breach should not internationalize environmental costs which prevent that consumers and producers pay the price of the environmental damages they cause; b) the lack of a policy to remove the interests in certain sectors and adopt policies to internalize costs to protect the environment and, at the same time, promote trade.

The last thing that I have to say is about The Biological Diversity Agreement, and in relation with TRIPS it’s needless to say they are different and their application field very distant; notwithstanding, it shares a common goal, sustainable development. In these sense, mutual help becomes an international duty, for which we have to begin with an approach from both that allows to conciliate the implementation of the specific values and goals of The Biological Diversity Agreement with the international liabilities on IP.

3) Innovation

About 2012 and 2014 Roadmap, there are differences between the both years in “Interaction between intellectual property and other policy areas” we can find a new point dedicated exclusively to “Innovation”. Why this difference? Imagine this is 1979: If you were reading this article (this comment) back then, chances are you would have read it on paper — with a printed newspaper or magazine in your hands. Today, you are probably reading it on a desktop computer, a laptop (or as a printout from either of these), or perhaps even on your Blackberry or iPhone. This is the innovation!

Maybe for this reason the president of de US said in 2012:

“I believe that in order to be globally competitive in the 21st century and to create an American economy that is built to last, we must create an environment where invention, innovation, and industry can flourish. We can work together to create an economy built on American manufacturing, American energy, and skills for American workers.” (Barack Obama).

In conclusion, we must be aware of this change and specially we must be careful. And is important to go step by step in order to avoid mistakes.

Links:

Economist, The (2013). ‘How Innovative is China?’, The Economist, 5 January 2013, online at http://www.economist.com/news/business/21569062-valuing-patents

“Comparing the 2012 Presidencil Candidates Technology and Innovation Policies” , The Information Technology & Innovation Foundation, online at https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=8&cad=rja&uact=8&ved=0CFcQFjAHahUKEwjU7prZhJ7IAhVGLhoKHXGoCqE&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww2.itif.org%2F2012-obama-romney-comparison.pdf&usg=AFQjCNGb1BzpCWYjSIPv1mVcB5Z59xDWQQ

Intellectual property rights are important tools for promoting technological and cultural advancement and by this way innovation can have a real societal impact. This is why we think that innovation is the most important global IP related issue.

We will start by defining what innovation is and explaining the role of intellectual property rights in the innovation process. Innovation is the fact of launching a new idea and applying it concrete cases. An efficient utilisation of the tools of intellectual property rights contribute to reduce the risks under which the authors are exposed. These authors can also earn an acceptable sum of money from their participation to the process.

The intellectual property rights are also useful to “enable companies to amortize such investments and to assure a return to those who supply the necessary capital”.

“New product development depends on the ability to pull together ideas, expertise and innovations from multiple disciplines, from multiple entities (both public and private) and from multiple countries” for this intellectual property rights are needed to protect the authors of the ideas.

Above that, intellectual property rights allows an “open innovation” which is a form of networked innovation where companies are able to work closely with partners and even competitors in many different ways like sharing ideas among others. This open innovation empowers companies by providing certainty and predictability.

Among these intellectual property rights, patents are the most important because patents promote innovation by allowing the inventor to recoup his investments. As the article 7 of the TRIP’s mentions it, patents and other intellectual property rights “should contribute to the promotion of technological innovation and to the transfer and dissemination of technology to the mutual advantage of producers and users of technological knowledge”.

The problem with patents is that there’s a time limit that lasts 20 years so the author/company must find another protection.

All these protections allows the authors to produce ideas they maybe wouldn’t have done if they hadn’t existed. The economic reward that these intellectual property rights give them encourage them to innovate. The incentive theory shared this idea that “If creators were not given adequate legal protection, many innovations would not occur and society would suffer as a result”. So intellectual property rights have a positive impact on society.

The impact on society is not only cultural but also economic because innovation and intellectual property are two main elements for empowering business. “Technology can generate significant development benefits. […] IPR support the innovative process and are a key component of enabling environments for foreign direct investment, partnership and international trade in goods and services»

The healthcare of society can also be improved by intellectual property rights. If the brand Aspirin didn’t have intellectual property protections the investors wouldn’t have accepted to give so much money on an innovation on which they would be losing their own monopoly over the aspirin molecule. Thanks to the trademark the Aspirin inventor Felix Hoffman could beneficiate of the brand to protect its market share endlessly.

But, we can see that despite the fact that the intellectual property rights give many advantages, they’re not enough to protect from every risks without any time limit.

Currently the governments are overwhelmed by the new technologies and the new inventions of the last decades. Due to globalization and internet, there is a need for better and harmonized protection on many different intellectual property rights among others trademarks and design. The scope of protection that these rights afford need to be clarified.
Therefore “policies aimed at forcing technology transfer, such as compulsory licensing, do not constitute a sound long-term strategy for technological advancement and growth.”

The governmental policies aimed at forcing technology transfer should be avoided and or limited to extremely rare short-term situations where there’s truly no alternative.

In conclusion, the innovation is a process who comes from the conception of an idea until the launching of a new product on the market. The intellectual property rights can be used efficiently to facilitate access to innovation. The new technologies have a better chance to be imposed on the market if intellectual property rights are used in a strategic way.