What R&D Is Being Done And Where In China: An Inventorisation Of Science Parks

Richard Jun Lin, Xavier Xie (analysers), Zhuo Zhang, Jerold Wang and Chris Hartshorn (data contributors) have worked on a project to inventorise China's 1,531 provincial and national-level industry parks: 'Seeing the Forest and the Trees: Navigating China’s Industry Park Innovation Engine'. It "reveals the need for a specific focus on 87 university science parks and tough decisions on how broadly efforts should focus geographically." Read more here.

It would be interesting to know what the IP climate is in all of these places. Are there schemes that encourage/subsidise patents and is there attention to the protection and enforcement of IPRs?

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Sobering Statistics Put China's Innovation Into Perspective

In the graphical perspective,
things become smaller if the distance
from the observer increases

Professor Anil Gupta and Haiyan Wang, writers of the book 'Getting China and India right', put China's innovation statistics into perspective.

Patent filings in 2008

• U.S.A. 400,769 filings
• Japan 502,054 filings
• China 203,481 filings

Gupta and Wang have a point when they argue that the Chinese inventions patented outside China are a more objective measure than the ones registered by State Intellectual Property Office (SIPO).
The most compelling statistic is the number for triadic patents or triadic patent families (patents that origin from one country but that are patented by the European Patent Office, United States Patent and Trademark Office and the Japan Patent Office).

Triadic patent families according to Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) in 2008

• Europe 14,525 filings
• U.S.A. 14,399 filings
• Japan 13,446 filings
• China 473 filings

See the Compendium on Patent Statistics for 2008 here (pdf) on page 6. 

However, I would argue that these patent filings are not the best measure. Patent registrations would be a far more better indication of patent quality. 

Professor Gupta and Mr Wang wrote: in 2010 China accounted for

• 20% of the world's population
• 9% of the world's GDP
• 12% of the world's R&D expenditure
• 1% of the patent filings with or patents granted by any of the leading patent offices outside China. 
• 50 % of the China-origin patents were granted to subsidiaries of foreign multinationals   

Professor Gupta's and Mr Wang's Wall Street Journal article 'China's Innovation Is A Paper Tiger' can be read here and should not be confused with the title of my thesis 'Paper Tiger Or Roaring Dragon, China's TRIPs Implementations and Enforcement'.

UPDATE August 2, 2011: 
Joff Wild, editor of Intellectual Asset Management gives an update since 2008. In short: the growth in the number of China's triadic patent filings/grants paints a rosy picture. However China's innovation prospect is much bleaker. On this I concur with Mr Wild. Read more about the relation between innovation and intellectual property and innovation and censorship here.

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China Launched 10-Year National Patent Development Strategy

During the 4th China Patent Week China launched the National Patent Development Strategy (2011-2020). The strategy focuses on:

• International cooperation in patent protection and utilisation;
• preferential policies to encourage R&D by high-tech companies, research institutes and colleges;
• Overseas IP websites so that foreign companies can check patent info;
• Establishment of organisations for patent trading in big cities.

To have a long term vision of a decade (the life-span of a utility patent and also design patent and half the life-span of an invention patent) is praiseworthy, although we have to see what the preferential policies exactly entail.

Read Hao Nan's China Daily article here.

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R&D in China: No Genuine Research, Only Development Thanks to Poor Execution IPR Laws

New Europe reports about EU firms' enthusiasm about China's market prospects and their concern about the execution of the IPR laws in China.

" “China’s intellectual property laws are not bad. The problem is their implementation,” [EU’s Chamber of Commerce in China (EUCCC) President Joerg] Wuttke said. One result of the poor execution of IPR laws is that companies don’t conduct “genuine” research and development in China, he said. “Companies build R&D centers, but the focus is on development, not really on research,” Wuttke said. “For the research part, companies are more willing to transfer Chinese scientists elsewhere to guarantee IPR protection.” "

Read the New Europe article here.

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