IPR filings from start-ups have nearly doubled in 6 yrs: MeITY official

The number of Intellectual Property Rights (IPR) filings from start-ups have nearly doubled in six years, a senior official in the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeITY) said on Thursday.

MeiTY Director Ajai Kumar Garg said a "sea change" in this direction came after the Centre brought the National IPR Policy in 2016.

"The number of IPR filings in India have increased significantly. Earlier there used to be 4,000 to 4,500 IPR filings annually six to seven years ago but today this number has nearly doubled in India," he told PTI on the sidelines of a seminar organised by the NASSCOM Centre of Excellence here.

"The governments, both central as well as states, are supporting start-ups and MSMEs on how to create better footprint around IPR. We should not work only for others, but also create IP for ourselves. Start-ups are the only way to do it and if we do not support it then we will forever remain dependent on technology. IPR is the only way to have ownership of technology," he said.

Noting that India still has a long way to go in IPRs, NASSCOM-CoE, Gurgaon, head Sudhanshu Mittal stressed on the need for start-ups to work on more patents which protect technical inventions, saying they can be an asset for new firms.

Identifying the challenges in the domain, Mittal said, "IPRs are largely not in the focus area of start-ups who concentrate more on products and services instead of patents.