Intellectual property (IP) is becoming an important factor in national socioeconomic development, particularly in the context of globalisation and international economic integration. The Vietnam Economic News reports.

Recently, the Ministry of Science and Technology’s National Office of Intellectual Property organised a workshop entitled “Management and Commercialization of Intellectual Property in Universities and Research Institutions” to promote the commercialisation and management of resources of intellectual property in Vietnam in the coming time.

Limited commercialisation of intellectual property

According to Deputy Director of the National Office of Intellectual Property of Vietnam Hoang Van Tan, the establishment of intellectual property rights (IPR) as well as the management and commercialisation of intellectual property have failed to meet expectations. The legal regulations and guidelines for managing intellectual property faced many shortcomings, along with insufficient awareness and practice of IPR.

In fact, institutions and universities registered very few commercialised patents. According to experts, the left-in-drawer research results were common for a long time, including the results of studies being protected by intellectual property rights. This made the transfer of technology more difficult and spoiled creativity.

According to Director of Office of Intellectual Property’s Research and Training Centre Nguyen Van Bay, the management and mining intellectual property at institutions specialising in creating applicable research results have failed to meet requirements. There are few protected patents successfully commercialised.

Le Thi Thu Ha, a lecturer at the Faculty of Economic and International Business in the Foreign Trade University, said: “The number of patent applications in Vietnam has steadily increased about 10 percent annually in recent years. However, the number of patent applications filed by Vietnamese accounts for only 6-8 percent. One of the reasons is that most universities and research institutions are heavily dependent on state funding, and unable to mobilise additional financial resources from the private sector.”

Enhanced collaborative research and applications

Experts from Japan Patent Office, Japan Institute for Promoting Invention and Innovation, and Kansai Technology Licensing Organization Co., Ltd. attended the “Management and Commercialization of Intellectual Property in Universities and Research Institutions” workshop and shared with Vietnamese partners experience in management and commercialization of intellectual property.

According to Isao Honzawa, Deputy Director, Information Systems Division, Japan Patent Office, Japanese universities assume the tasks of scientific research, training, and put the findings into practice.

To do that, the Japanese Government has launched a number of policies to promote cooperation between companies and universities. For example, companies and universities will join in research projects. These companies will communicate specific research projects for universities and the latter will transfer the research results to the former under signed licensing contracts.

In the coming time, the cooperation of the management and commercialization of intellectual property in universities and research institutes in Japan and Vietnam will be further enhanced, said Isao Honzawa.

According to Le Thi Thu Ha, relationships between universities and businesses should be developed to create conditions for the development of science and technology markets, obtain benefit from commercial exploitation of intellectual property, and effectively support domestic universities in scientific research and development activities.-VNA