Intellectual property protection: Govt increases professional charges of IP facilitators for startups

The government on Friday said it has almost doubled the fees for IP facilitators under startups intellectual property protection (SIPP) scheme.

The commerce and industry ministry said that the revised scheme is applicable from November 2.

"To further encourage IP facilitators to provide quality services to startups in order to increase the number of IP applications filed by startups, the scheme has now been revised and facilitation fees has been notably increased by at least 100 per cent," the ministry said on Friday.

For patents, fees at the time of filing of application has been increased to Rs 15,000 from Rs 10,000 earlier. Similarly, for trade marks and designs, it has been revised upwards to Rs 3,000 from Rs 2,000.

To protect and promote IP rights (IPR) of startups and to encourage innovation and creativity among them, the government launched the SIPP scheme in 2016.

The scheme facilitated startups in filing and processing of their patent, design or trademark application through the assistance of IP facilitators, whose fee was borne by the Office of the Controller General of Patents Designs and Trademarks.

After its successful implementation resulting in a significant increase in IP fillings by startups, the scheme was extended for a period of three years till March 31, next year.

It added that IP filling by startups is also encouraged by providing fee rebates under respective IP legislations.

Startups are provided 80 per cent fee rebate in filing patent applications and 50 per cent fee rebate in filling trademark application. In addition, there are also provisions for fast-track examination of patent applications.

"As on September 30, Rs 380.81 lakh have been disbursed as fees to the facilitators assisting the startups in IP fillings. The revised fee structure will further augment the filing of IP applications by startups through the assistance of IP facilitators offering effective and quality service," it added. Patent applications filed by startups have increased from 179 in 2016-17 to 1,500 in 2021-22. Similarly, trade mark applications rose to 8,649 in 2021-22 from only four in 2016-17.