Vet World   Vol.12   July-2019  Article-22

Intellectual property management at the National Animal Science Research Institute in India: A case study

Background and Aim: The National Institute of Veterinary Epidemiology and Disease Informatics is an animal science research institute under the aegis of the Indian Council of Agricultural Research. The intellectual property management system (IPMS) of the institute oversees technology creation, protection, and transfer/commercialization. This study reviews the effectiveness of the IPMS using traditional strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats (SWOT) evaluation.

Materials and Methods: A comprehensive repository was developed to compile the SWOT pertaining to the IPMS based on relevant document reviews and the inputs of experts and stakeholders. The repository was shared among scientists of the institute for rating. The rating process revealed the top ten key SWOT associated with the structure and operation of the IPMS. The weighted SWOT matrix technique was used to identify the best strategies to improve and develop the IPMS further. This included strategies derived from the best combinations of key strengths and opportunities (S-O strategies), key weaknesses and opportunities (W-O strategies), key strengths and threats (S-T strategies), and key weaknesses and threats (W-T strategies).

Results: The top-ranked strengths included "possession of patented technology" and "state-of-the-art biosafety laboratory facilities," while "lack of in-house faculty with legal expertise in intellectual property rights (IPR)"" and "lack of technology incubation facilities" were the key weaknesses. The key opportunities included "external funding for research projects" and "market demand for onsite diagnostic tools." The major threats were "lack of market for veterinary diagnostics" and "broadbased patents on research tools and technologies."

Conclusion: The strengths of the system, such as a state-of-the-art biosafety laboratory and technology-marketing collaboration with Agrinnovate India Ltd., could be employed effectively to gain from the opportunities tendered by the market demand for on-site disease diagnostic tools (S-O strategies). The limitation arising from a dearth of technical staff could be overcome by technological backstopping through international linkages in the area of disease monitoring and surveillance. Funding from externally supported projects could also be utilized for recruitment of personnel (W-O strategies). Limitations arising from the combination of inadequate in-house IPR expertise and the threat arising from broadbased patents on research tools warrant vigilance (W-T strategies). Keywords: Indian Council of Agricultural Research, intellectual property management system, intellectual property rights, National Institute of Veterinary Epidemiology and Disease Informatics, strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats analysis.

Keywords: Indian Council of Agricultural Research, intellectual property management system, intellectual property rights, National Institute of Veterinary Epidemiology and Disease Informatics, strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats analysis.

How to cite this article: Chandrasekharan CC, Jiji RS (2019) Intellectual property management at the National Animal Science Research Institute in India: A case study, Veterinary World, 12(7): 1070-1077.

Received: 06-03-2019  Accepted: 08-06-2019     Published online: 20-07-2019

Corresponding author: R. S. Jiji   E-mail: jiji@kvasu.ac.in

DOI: 10.14202/vetworld.2019.1070-1077

Copyright: Chandrasekharan and Jiji, et al. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license, and indicate if changes were made. The Creative Commons Public Domain Dedication waiver (http:// creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/) applies to the data made available in this article, unless otherwise stated.