Russian patent may not live long enough to move to Skolkovo

04.05.2010 — Analysis

During 2008, the year that was relatively trouble-free for Russia, around 200 billion of budget roubles had been spent on funding research and development work. Three quarters of this money has been wasted as the majority of the developments has not presented any commercial value and, naturally, was not in demand by the market.

Experts believe this result to be rather typical as Russia lacks the infrastructure of the civilised intellectual property market. It is required for planning and valuation of research at the initial stages. This is exactly what the Eurasian Centre for Intellectual Property is going to do. Stanislav Nikolayev, the Centre's Director, wants to establish an intellectual property exchange which would help determine what a certain research work costs and who might need it. Provisionally he is planning to take inventory of intellectual property accumulated in higher education establishments, distribute intellectual property rights, and legally record them.

The Centre is going to counteract the dissemination of pirated products and uncivilised use of someone else's designs. The majority of textbooks, teaching aids, and other intellectual products created by employees of higher education establishments is not protected by copyright. Administrations of education establishments up until recently had not been interested in patenting because it was not giving them anything except for additional expenses and headaches.

Today having the legally confirmed property rights on inventions is viewed as one of the preconditions for entering into contractual relations with the State for the performance of experimental and design work. Higher education authorities have the right to establish commercial enterprises and include intellectual property into the registered share capital. Thus every self respecting institution now has a centre for intellectual property, collective access, technology transfer etc.

The Eurasian Centre being created at the Association of Higher Establishments in the Urals will, in fact, do the same work as the university centres. Stanislav Nikolayev is not concerned: "We will not fight against anybody. Our goal as we see it is to bring together all those who have intellectual property and those who need it. The more centres there are, the sooner we will come to a civilised situation in the market. Whilst we are not a commercial organisation we do plan to make money on intangible assets".

Ilyas Paderin, the CEO of the Urals Technology Transfer Centre, however, claims that there are very few patents capable of generating commercial success left in higher education establishments. According to his data enterprising scientists who made discoveries have either gone into business or emigrated a long time ago. What is left in higher education establishments is academic dead weight and young specialists who are only studying the research work. To blame are not only the reforms of the nineties which starved the education establishments, but Soviet practices too, often not encouraging the scientist who made a discovery but even repressing him. So, most talented researchers have found an output for their energy having established commercial enterprises either abroad (quite legally) or in Russia (actually half-underground as they continues to work in higher education establishments). Patens went with them.

In Ekaterinburg, Ilyas Paderin claims, scientists established about 200 companies. Many dropped out - only a third of research works proved interesting to investors. Business invested into production of pharmaceuticals and new medical equipment, fire extinguishing systems, catalysts, water disinfection systems, and production of high purity grade substances.

Experts do not rule out that higher education establishments may produce patents promising commercial gains but in order to get them into the market commercialisation centres should be established rather than intellectual property exchanges. The same location should bring together patent specialists to carry out the huge research work, experts to assess the technical side of the invention, marketing specialists with connections to business who know the market and can say what might make profit. The problem is that there are very few of these specialists in Russia.

Venera Murzakayeva, the RF Patent Attorney, says that in five years time there will be no people left who can draft a patent application. All patent specialists are over 60 and there does not seem to be any new ones coming. Lawyers cannot work with inventions and technical specialists, as a rule, are experts in very narrow sphere who can only work with patents in their own sector. Physicists make good specialists but the trade is only taught in Moscow and it costs money which would be rather a lot for a provincial. This is the reason why some commercial companies in Ekaterinburg engaged in valuation of intellectual property cannot expand their operations. Mrs Murzakayeva believes that creation of yet another centre would simply exacerbate the staff shortage.

In recent 20 years Russian science acquired a lot of problems: specialists left, continuity of generation has been broken, science schools are in ruins. A lot of hard work is needed to restore the former potential of the Russian science - training specialists, developing measures for the support of science schools, inciting manufacturers of innovative products etc. In the meantime the State announced that a "silicone valley" will be built from scratch in Skolkovo.

Not so long ago a patent in Russia cost 3 thousand roubles which could be paid in within three years. Payment by instalment is impossible now and the sum of money has been doubled. The result was pretty much immediate; the number of applications submitted to Rospatent has rapidly dropped. According to Mrs Murzakayeva, Ekaterinburg Medical Academy used to submit up to 30 patent applications a year while now only a few are ready to pay 6 thousand roubles as a lump sum. Patent specialists are at a loss: the State proclaims a course to modernization making the innovations policies tougher at the same time. This is, probably, a purely Russian failure when those at the top have no idea of what is happening below.

Vladimir Terletski