James Dyson, the British inventor and Chief Engineer of the Dyson Company (see also Categories/Chairman?s Blog/Fairness/Job Creation in the right hand index column), writing in the Sunday Times of 16th January, 2011 on protection of Intellectual Property (IP) rights, knows that ideas, technology and exports are key to reshaping the British economy with, as in Germany, manufacturing (& not just financial services) the driving force for recovery. Manufacturing he defines as the generation of unique goods to patent and export, independent of the location of final assembly i.e. on the model of Apple and Dyson. He views as promising, therefore, for the next generation of British inventors, the technical schools initiated by the Conservative peer Lord Baker and e.g. the engineering academy opened by JCB, the British construction equipment company. Citing China as a key market offering British exporters major opportunities, he raises the issue of how to protect IP rights.
Dyson in common with other technology companies invests heavily in research and development, the associated financial risk partly offset if it can rely on its ideas and products being protected. Taking protective action around the world is expensive and time consuming, its value based on being able to enforce the rules, assuming each country plays by the same set of rules. However, a robust and solid European Union patent system is continually undermined by e.g. companies in China (and China is said to be the worst offender) which continue to ignore this and other patent protection systems, steal IP and thereby produce counterfeit goods.
China apparently has indicated that it would do more to improve IP protection, wanting to increase the number of patents it grants to 2 million by 2015. With proper enforcement of IP law China would also be a fairer and more hospitable trading environment for the Dyson Company. The Asian taskforce established before the November last visit of David Cameron to China, is proposed as having a crucial role to play in influencing action on fair , global trade by all parties involved.