The Intellectual Property Department is set to create a fast-track system for patent registration to facilitate Thai inventors, starting with a pilot project on inventions related to health care, including medicines, treatments, care and food.
Vuttikrai Leewiraphan, the department's director-general, said the new system will increase competitiveness in innovation and intellectual property as well as create more employment and income for Thais and entrepreneurs.
The system is scheduled for introduction next month.
Currently patent applications and registrations take about 55 months from the filing date until the patent is granted. Under the fast-track system, the consideration period will be cut by half to 24-36 months.
From the start of the Covid-19 pandemic until last Friday, there have been 225 Thai patents and petty patent applications related to the prevention and treatment of the coronavirus, comprising 61 invention patent applications and 164 petty patent applications.
There are three patent types available in Thailand: patent for invention, petty patent and design patent (also known as industrial design).
The invention patent has the strictest requirements to qualify for protection, followed by the petty patent, then the design patent.
The invention patent protection period is 20 years, while the protection period for the design and petty patents is 10 years.
In a related development, on April 21 Deputy Commerce Minister Sinit Lertkrai presided over the signing ceremony of a memorandum of understanding (MoU) on intellectual property between the Intellectual Property Department and Chulalongkorn University to generate commercial sales for research in order to help Thai startups build businesses through intellectual property.
The MoU with Chulalongkorn University is a pilot project to link leading Thai universities with more than 300 Thai entrepreneurs in networks to make the best use of available research for commercial purposes.
According to Mr Vuttikrai, the research and Thai-registered innovations can create economic opportunities, while also helping to reduce technology imports from abroad, generating sustainable income for the country and helping it to avoid the middle-income trap.
