Richard Bruton (Dublin North Central, Fine Gael)
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The Intellectual Property Unit of my Department is responsible for intellectual property laws and policies. The Irish Patents Office (IPO) implements the system of intellectual property protection across all formal types (patent, trademark, industrial designs, copyright), and provides input in the drafting of certain legislation and in the formulation of policy. The website of the Irish Patents Office offers a range of orientation and guidance material on uses of Intellectual Property for businesses, as well as a Good Practice Guide on how to better integrate IP into business plans and strategies. There are links to a number of searchable databases for patents, trademarks and designs, though the IPO recommend taking professional assistance in doing so rather than self-searching. The IPO participates in introductory courses for people wishing to start a business organised by Local Enterprise Offices.

Patents are protected under the 1992 Irish Patents Act, with both full (20 years) and short-term (10 years) patents available by registering an application with the IPO. A process is currently underway to participate in the Unitary Patent System, with a local branch to be established in Dublin, which would facilitate businesses or inventors filing actions under patent law in a single court case to decide on the validity of patents throughout 25 EU Member States.

Copyrights enforcement is automatic (Irish Copyrights Act 2000), with no requirement to register a copyright. This places the emphasis of protection on the creator. Copyright legislation is currently under review, following the Modernising Copyright review (2013), which made recommendations to streamline and simplify the processes of protecting Copyright, from undertaking the full amount of exemptions permissible in the EU, to offering early and expeditious resolution structures.

Enterprise Ireland supports Intellectual Property (IP) activities among its client companies via the Research and Development Fund and High Potential Start-up equity support. These initiatives can cover IP activities where they represent an important part of an R&D project or the formation of a new company. Support for the preparation, filing and validation of a patent application is available as well as costs incurred in renewing the application before the patent/right has been granted. Such costs include translation and other costs incurred in order to obtain the granting or validation of the right in other appropriate countries.

Enterprise Ireland also coordinates the Enterprise Europe Network (EEN), a non-financial support to assist SMEs become more innovative. The EEN helps companies in identifying licensable technologies and provides advice on best practice for Intellectual Property Rights (IPR) management and through the EU IPR Helpdesk. The EEN services are specifically designed for SMEs but are also available to all businesses and Higher Education Institutions.

The EU IPR Helpdesk is the official IP service initiative of the European Commission and offers free of charge, first-line support on IP and IPR matters to beneficiaries of EU funded research projects and EU SMEs. In addition, the EU IPR Helpdesk offers free of charge training events on different aspects of IP management and IPR based on a practical and comprehensive training approach.

One of the main objectives of the EU IPR Helpdesk is to raise IP awareness and build capacities among European SMEs all across Europe.

This is done by offering on-site training events in the different European countries, by participating in awareness-raising events, by providing individual consultancy through the IPR Helpdesk and by developing and disseminating a broad range of useful publications such as guidelines, case studies and fact sheets that deal with different aspects of IP – both in business and in collaborative research.

IDA support in this area relates to the R&D activity itself rather than protection of the output of that activity by way of registering IP and patents. IDA Ireland multinational clients have well-established IP protection policies which would apply to their Irish subsidiaries. While IDA Ireland does not have a dedicated scheme to support IP protection alone, it would be expected that client companies would seek to protect IP arising from IDA Ireland grant supported R&D projects.

Indirect supports for IP are available to firms in Ireland via a variety of tax-related measures, including; tax relief for capital expenditure incurred by companies on the provision or acquisition of intangible assets for the purpose of trade; credit for foreign royalty income; withholding tax on patent royalty payments and stamp duty exemptions.

In this regard the State’s R&D Tax Credit scheme is a very important element of Ireland’s Corporation Tax regime in terms of attracting foreign direct investment to Ireland and deepening the research capabilities of firms based in Ireland. The firm commitment to the continuation and development of the R&D Tax Credit scheme is a key part of Ireland’s competitive offering for both foreign direct investment and Irish enterprises.

The Minister for Finance announced in the context of Budget 2015 that consideration is being given to the introduction of a Knowledge Development Box – a competitive income-based regime for intangible assets - along the lines of patent and innovation boxes which exist in other countries. In this light, a public consultation process has been launched to gather views on how the Knowledge Development Box should operate.

The environmental conditions for IP are considered to be good in Ireland, based on a comparative review across a number of European countries, such as Finland, Denmark, Sweden and Germany.

This review is titled - Enhancing the Intellectual Property Activities in the Firm Base in Ireland (Technopolis 2015) - and will be published on Thursday 9 July. Ireland is committed to enforcement of IP, with a strong legal base and active courts. We have a modern legislative framework that includes a Common Law jurisdiction with an independent court system and legal protections for the creators and owners of IP. Ireland is also party to the majority of international co-operations treaties and memberships, such as the EPC and TRIPS Agreement, the World Intellectual Property Organisation (WIPO), European Patent Office (EPO), European Community (EU), Office for Harmonisation of the Internal Market (OHIM), the World Trade Organisation and various WIPO-administered Treaties.