Vietnam remains weak in commercializing intellectual property

“While the issue of establishing intellectual property rights has been well-considered and promoted in recent times, the management and commercialization of intellectual property in Vietnam is still lacking and weak.”

The above information was given by Mr. Hoang Van Tan, Deputy Director of the Department of Intellectual Property (Ministry of Science and Technology) at the Workshop on management and commercialization of intellectual property in universities and research institutes on September 25.

Mr. Hoang Van Tan: "Commercialization of intellectual property is still lacking and weak."
(Photo: TH/Vietnam+)

Managing and commercializing intellectual property is an important step to bring intellectual property into life. Therefore, Mr. Tan believes that the current legal regulations to manage and guide this issue still have many shortcomings. Although the management agency has made many efforts, this activity is still limited compared to the potential of intellectual property creation in society.

Mr. Nguyen Van Bay, Director of the Research and Training Center (Intellectual Property Office), said that universities and research institutes in any country in the world are the cradles of creative results and Vietnam is no exception.

This expert frankly stated that although intellectual property issues in Vietnam have been mentioned quite a lot, their implementation in schools and research institutes still has many shortcomings. Lecturers and scientists still do not fully understand the value of intellectual property rights, and there is no specialized department to monitor, advise and guide to ensure the rights of researchers.

In addition, many products have not been registered for exclusive protection or if they are registered, management and commercial exploitation are very limited. This leads to many difficulties in technology transfer and does not encourage innovation.

“Research institutes that specialize in creating results that can be applied in practice have not yet met the requirements for intellectual property management and exploitation. There are not many typical inventions that are protected exclusively and successfully exploited commercially,” Mr. Bay commented.

Regarding this issue, Dr. Le Thi Thu Ha, lecturer at the Faculty of Economics and International Business (Foreign Trade University, Hanoi) said that the number of patent applications in Vietnam in recent years has increased steadily by about 10% annually. However, the number of patent applications filed by Vietnamese people only accounts for about 6-8%.

One of the reasons given by this expert is that schools and research institutes are too dependent on state funding and have not been able to mobilize other financial sources, especially from businesses.

From there, Dr. Thu Ha expressed her opinion that it is necessary to build cooperative relationships between universities and businesses to grasp practical needs, create conditions for the development of the science and technology market; establish technology transfer offices and intellectual property management departments in schools; and reasonably allocate benefits from revenue from commercial exploitation of intellectual property.

Agreeing, Mr. Nguyen Van Bay said that schools and research institutes need to issue appropriate documents and mechanisms for intellectual property management, in which attention should be paid to identifying protected objects; developing regulations for managing and exploiting intellectual property activities...

Experts also believe that only when intellectual property is well commercialized can we hope to promote development, research innovation, and avoid the brain drain phenomenon, which is a headache for managers./.

According to (Vietnam+) - VT