India: Analyzing Indian IP Trends

Indian IP scenario is undergoing a fascinating transformation. The office of the Controller General of Patents, Designs and Trademarks (CGPDTM) is making relentless efforts in order to improve the current IP landscape in India.

CGPTDM is committed towards making the Indian IP climate suitable for innovation and technological growth in India. The present government has realized the importance of a balanced IP system to address the country's innovation and development related objectives. And the efforts show up in the initiatives like new IP policy, amendment in Patent rules, amendment in trademark rules etc. The CGPDTM is also incessantly working towards making the average patent grant time from 5-7 years to 18 months by March 2018.

In an official report released by CGPDTM the Indian IP development trends were discussed and analyzed for the year 2015-16.

As per the CGPDTM report, in the year 2015-16, 30% growth was recorded in filing of IP applications. 10%, 19% and 34.47% growth was recorded in the fields of Patent, Design and Trademark application filing respectively in comparison to previous years.

Trends with respect to filing of Indian IP applications

The trends in Patents, Designs, Trademarks and Geographical Indications were also analyzed and assessed independently.

Patent trends: 10% growth was recorded in patent application filing in comparison to the previous year.

Design trends: Design application filing showed an increase of 19% as compared to 2014-15.

Trademark trends: Trademark application filing showed a whopping increase of 34.47% as compared to the previous year.

Geographical Indications trends: A total number of 26 Geographical Indications were registered in contrast to 20 last year.

The figures depicted above surely are expected to encourage the government to facilitate and expedite the development of an efficient and transparent IP system for efficient delivery of public services.

As a result of Start-up India initiative, the office of CGPDTM is taking steps to encourage IPR protection amongst startups, which includes providing facilitators to start ups to file and process their applications for patents, designs and trademarks and reimbursement of professional charges of facilitators. The provisions pertaining to necessary assistance via emails and helpdesk are also mentioned in the report.

Other initiatives were also adopted in order to expedite the IP registration process have been introduced. The idea is not only to clear backlog but also to streamline the whole procedure.

These initiatives can be summarized as:

+Enforcement of the new trademark rules. The provisions mentioned in the new trademark rules can be seen here;

+Prompt actions for the applications sent under Right to Information Act;

+Automation of renewal of registration process;

+Official communications to be sent to the applicant's/agent's email id

+Electronic system for issuance of registration of registration certificates from TMO (Trademark Office) Mumbai;

+Online filing of all trademark forms;

+Automation of application allotment in order to achieve transparency;

+E-filing facility of design applications;

+The office of CGPDTM has acquired ISO 9001:2008 certification to establish a quality management system for design registration.

While all the achievements are encouraging, there is still a long way to go in order to establish a favorable and encouraging IP ecosystem in India.

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