Canada focus: Taking IP seriously
In announcing the new IP strategy on April 26, 2018, and following the 2018 federal budget, the message sent by Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and his team was loud and clear: Canada needed to improve its record on IP awareness, protection for good faith owners and access for Canadian businesses and innovators, as “intellectual property is a key component of an innovation economy”.
As Canada is lagging behind other countries in innovation, dropping from 15th place in 2016 to 18th (as per the 2018 Global Innovation Index released on July 10), this is certainly good news and a good first step towards much-needed change.
Many Canadians do not fully understand what IP is, and when and why it should be protected. They also need to be made aware of the means by which they can license their own technology or access valuable third-party technologies through licensing.
This new strategy will cause significant changes to applicable legislation, the details of which have not yet been made available, as the official texts need to be presented first to the House of Commons of Canada (possibly in September). The new IP strategy will target many loopholes in the present legislation which benefit squatters and bad faith registrants, among other issues.
For example, the government will adopt new measures such as new grounds for trademark opposition and invalidation proceedings, based on bad faith, as well as a new requirement that a trademark be “used” in Canada within the first three years after registration in order to be enforceable.
Measures such as these will help counter the detrimental effects, for good faith owners, of changes made to the Trademarks Act by the previous federal government, when the need for use prior to registration was abolished.
Funding available
In addition to legislative changes, there will also be more money in the pot. Out of the C$85.3 million ($64.8 million) announced in the new IP strategy over the next five years, C$30 million will be directed towards the creation of a patent collective (what will be covered remains unclear at this time); C$21.5 million to improve access to IP expertise and legal advice; and C$33.8 million for establishing an IP “marketplace” (listing public-owned IP made available for license or sale), among other strategic IP tools.
Funding also targets several issues including raising IP awareness and literacy, support for businesses run by women and indigenous peoples, improving IP access, IP clinics, better trained and expert governmental employees and funding for the Copyright Board of Canada.
