Giving an overview of the progress in IPRs over the past fifteen years, Justice Rao said that IPRs have moved from an arcane area of legal analysis and a policy backwater to the forefront of global economic policy making. The result has been a successful conclusion of the Agreement on Trade- Related aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPs) under the WTO regime. This has elevated the protection and enforcement of IPRs to the level of solemn international commitment. He said the new global IPR system has come with both benefits and costs. Stronger IPR protection should increase incentives for innovation and raise returns to international technology transfer. However, it also could raise the costs of acquiring new technology and products, shifting the global terms of trade in favour of technology producers and against technology consumers.

    Justice Rao referred to India’s preparedness to meet challenges of globalization by adjustment of its laws and by enacting new laws as well as citing cases decided by the Supreme Court of India and direction therefrom to meet the challenges of IPRs under WTO regime. He said that the foundation of patent law all over the world was based on concepts of novelty and inventiveness or lack of obviousness. Justice Rao mentioned some of the significant points identified by the Government for exports in the arena of IPRs. These are :patenting inventions, valuing patents, encashing IPR assets, technology upgradation and IPR protection- these are the areas that needed to be expeditiously examined with an eye on innovative solutions.

    The concept of high value addition in the exported goods is very critical, particularly in the context of large volume contributed by the small scale industries.

    Export seems to be very necessary component in our future balancing of existing capacity and demand. Also there is need to build competitiveness through the technology we develop.

    It was felt that in the export, many segments of the intellectual property are to play their respective roles notable in technical aspect domain.

    It is felt that industry in machine tools sector has to have more sound design base to ensure their competitiveness in the future. New concepts /technology in foundry industry and leather industry are to be adopted for larger share in the global market. Similarly, technology should be looked at as a saviour in reorganizing the structure of sports goods, locks and furniture industries in meeting the technological changes.

    This project is also covering the areas of (a) Patenting Inventions, (b) current patents and technology upgradation (c) Valuing patents and cashing IPR assets and (d) Protection for IPR Infringement and Damages-Case Studies.