Protecting innovation for a green future .

To mark World IP Day 2020 and its focus on cleantech, Jeremy Holmes, Head of IP, IP Group gives his reflections on the sector.

As we are all now facing a very uncertain future, each sat at home in lockdown watching a global health catastrophe play out, it is even more timely for us to reflect on another emergency that requires a global response – climate change, and how, as technologists, we can try and address the issues it presents. 

I have been lucky enough to work alongside many exciting cleantech companies addressing issues such as the energy transition. These have all been at very different stages of their journey, but all of them have faced the same challenges to integrate IP into their business plan. The opportunities range from clean energy based on exciting battery technologies (companies such as Ceres Power, Bramble Energy and RFC Power), opportunities in wind power, better energy management of systems such as hot water tanks (Mixergy) and efficient carbon capture (C-Capture).

What links all these opportunities is a core idea which often takes time to be demonstrated credibly, and then needs partnering to take it through the key stages of its journey.

The role of IP

Cleantech innovation comes in many shapes and forms but what has really struck me is how much more visible it has become over the last few years, and that it is driven by scientists and entrepreneurs pushing boundaries, taking risks and getting results. The speed with which ideas and ideologies can be shared across the internet and social media has been a major factor in this phenomenon, and I thought that I would take this opportunity as a technologist and an IP professional, to reflect on what role IP plays here and what particular challenges there are.

For me the role of IP for any tech start-up is threefold: protection, continuity and clarity.

Protection

What is it that needs protecting? The technology is often a combination of different component technologies requiring a leap of faith from those involved, and a lot of iteration to get it to work at its best. Defending and protecting this ‘clever combination’ presents a particular challenge to IP protection. This is where having IP built into the business plan from a very early stage can help anticipate these questions and head them off at the pass. Knowing when to protect a product, or a process, or both is vital, as is knowing which parts to keep under wraps as know-how or trade secrets.

Continuity 

The journey from idea to success to eventual sales is always a bumpy one and, in this space, the tech can easily head down several dead ends before it gets on the right track. The IP needs to evolve alongside tech, so a consistent ongoing internal review and strategy process needs to be in place, with regular audits and some tough decisions on what to do with a limited budget. The hidden cost is time, and it is often easy to underestimate how much time needs to be applied to IP at regular intervals to make sure it is moving in the right direction.

Clarity

Robust IP is, in many cases, essential to the commercialisation of an idea and the funding of the ‘entrepreneurial’ journey. Many clean technologies need convincing proof of ‘scale up’, which can only come about in partnership with key major players in the relevant industry. They will scrutinise the IP very closely to make sure it is, in their eyes, fit for purpose, and at this point clear presentation not just of the IP portfolio as it stands, but also its history and future strategy, will be crucial. This for me is the ‘clarification’ part, setting the key parts of the technology in a sound legal context. The whole journey is building towards adoption, which needs not just industry partnership but government support too. Again, factoring this in from as early a stage as possible is crucial, and this means navigating government-led initiatives to help with the IP.

How does it work?

So how is the current IP system suited to this journey, especially for green technologies? While many often dismiss IP, and especially patents, as complex, unwieldy, and expensive, they do in fact provide a swift and efficient way of “staking out” early protection of a nascent technology. This can start from a fairly ‘basic’ filing in a single country, followed by a wider ‘international’ plan for the ideas that show high potential for success.

The process of taking a patent international is governed by two multinational systems—the Paris Convention and the Patent Cooperation Treaty (PCT). These, along with agreements between individual countries, aim to encourage smaller companies to participate in the IP process (through fee reductions, tax breaks and the like) and provide ways of getting it to run faster where needed (for example, the Patent Prosecution Highway or PPH).

There are many cleantech initiatives in place. For example, in the UK there is accelerated patent processing via the Green Channel at the UK Intellectual Property Office. This, in conjunction with the PPH, can start to give a growing ‘family’ of granted patents, which often provides reassurance to investors as to the robustness of the protection. The World International Patent Office (WIPO) has its own “WIPO Green Marketplace” for technology exchange in this area.

IP education is not being embedded early enough in the entrepreneurial process

Flexibility and planning are key here, and IP professionals can play their part by becoming much more business aware, moving away from patenting for patenting’s sake, and looking at the longer-term picture. This means understanding the business and technological challenges faced by companies.

So what more needs to be done? I still think that IP education is not being embedded early enough in the entrepreneurial process, so I applaud the opportunity brought each year by World IP Day to focus on a particular sector and not only to show the tremendous amount of inventive work being done, but also to draw entrepreneurs themselves closer to seeing the value of investing not just money, but also time in their IP protection.