If we look at Europe from a historical perspective, we will see that there have been hundreds of inventors who have contributed to making our lives healthier, easier and more productive: Katalin Karikó with messenger RNA (ribonucleic acid) technology for vaccines against Covid- 19; Karlheinz Brandenburg with MP3 or Jaap Haartsen with Bluetooth, among many others.
However, in order to analyze the real state of inventive activity in Europe, we need to go beyond these unique examples and question whether the continent is harnessing its full creative potential to drive our society and economy forward through innovation. We have to compare Europe with other innovative regions of the world.
If we look at the data on the productivity of inventiveness, we can objectively conclude that Europe can do better. I should do better. Despite the fact that Europe invests 20% of global spending on RD and that this translates into 20% of scientific production (based on the number of scientific publications), in 2020 the European Patent Office registered only 10% of world applications for global patents -a figure lower than the 17% registered in 2010-.
In other words, all the effort that companies and taxpayers make to invest in RD translates into a proportional production of science, however, when it comes to transforming this scientific production on a European scale into innovations that solve the problems of our day by day, the result is not up to expectations.
The reasons for this difference in inventive productivity lie elsewhere. How can we encourage inventiveness in the Old Continent? Does Europe’s patent system encourage inventiveness and innovation enough? The reality is not very positive.
Although the entry into force of the European Patent Convention (1973) and the creation of the European Patent Office (EPO) represented a great advance in the promotion of European inventiveness, the results, 50 years later, show that it is necessary to make major improvements. And it is that currently the OEP is only the fifth patent office in the world with respect to the number of applications, according to the World Intellectual Property Organization, behind China -which has recently climbed to the first position in the ranking-, the United States, Japan and Korea.
Beyond the cultural differences and economic dynamics that could partially explain why Europe lags behind other regions of the world with regard to the number of patent applications, we would have to focus on the European patent system itself.
The current European patent system is still fragmented, as European patents are divided into local and national patents when granted. This means a real odyssey for inventors and technology companies when it comes to defending their rights against copies, because they have to validate patents in each of the countries. Although the unitary patent will offer a unified protection of patent rights throughout Europe from 2023, the countries that have adhered still do not reach two thirds of the states of the European Union, and there are two, Spain and Croatia, They have decided to stay away.
We urgently need all EU countries to ratify the unitary patent agreement as soon as possible, to finally create a unified market for inventions and technological assets in Europe, a market that will be bigger than the US one.
If we add to this the role of the Unified Patent Court for the effective application of this agreement in the future, it is to be expected that from 2023 the European patent system will experience an increase in activity comparable to what was seen in the US. in 1982, when the Federal Circuit Court of Appeals was created, improving the consistency and predictability of patent rights across the country. A predictable patent right at European level will undoubtedly provide great confidence to inventors and their investors to mitigate the risks inherent in innovation.
A unified, coherent, reliable and predictable European patent system is urgently needed. But it is also essential that it be competitive and accessible to everyone, and that it focus on offering complete protection for everything that is patentable in an application. If in Europe we want to ensure that inventors can unleash their full potential and offer their inventions to society, we have to work together to make the European patent system the best in the world.
Carles Puente, professor at the Polytechnic University of Catalonia – BarcelonaTech. Co-founder and inventor of Fractus
