Part eight of the thirteen part Summit TV series on intellectual property takes a look at the Pebble Bed Modular Reactor Company and their knowledge protection strategies and practices with Dr Adi Paterson.

STEPHAN LAMPRECHT: Welcome to the Intellectual Property show on Summit TV. Tonight we’re probing the role of intellectual property (IP) management in one of the most knowledge intensive projects currently in South Africa - I’m joined in the studio by Dr Adi Paterson a key architect of the National System of Innovation and now head of business development at the Pebble Bed Modular Reactor (PBMR). Adi, you’ve been in the inner circle of probably most of the discussions in the last decade or so about this issue of a knowledge economy and the National System of Innovation (NSI) - how committed is government to growing our own intellectual property base and working from that?

ADI PATERSON: I think government has shown quite a few commitments. First there is a clear policy framework that’s going to enable more intellectual property to be created, public funding of research has increased fairly significantly over the last few years - and a lot of that increase in public funding has been focused on innovation rather than on old-style research and development. That’s very positive - but I don’t think we can be satisfied until we reach for example a target of more patents secured by South Africans than secured by foreigners patenting in South Africa.

STEPHAN LAMPRECHT: What is the situation currently?

ADI PATERSON: At the moment less than 25% of total patents in South Africa go to South Africans - some of those are of low quality as well because we don’t have a proper examination process. I’m hoping that by stimulating a new interest in intellectual property and funding and resourcing it properly we can change that.

STEPHAN LAMPRECHT: For example you mentioned the issue of examination - how do you foresee that happening?

ADI PATERSON: I think in a country like South Africa it would be possible to join with other small countries that have small examination offices - and partner with them to develop a capability to examine patents in South Africa. I don’t know of any country that wants to be serious in the knowledge economy that doesn’t have some special arrangements - or its own arrangements to examine patents properly.

STEPHAN LAMPRECHT: Out of that other services would also grow for intellectual property management - not just patenting and the registration side, but also stimulating innovation and understanding of the system - is that the way you see this happening?

ADI PATERSON: I believe if we are going to have a serious knowledge economy there have to be many more people who are charged with the responsibility of thinking about knowledge - how it becomes valuable, and how it’s used in an economy like ours. This is what I think Finland has done, South Korea has done it - we see India dramatically changing its policies and being very effective. We need to be part of that journey.

STEPHAN LAMPRECHT: If you think for example of the current Bill under discussion regarding intellectual property funded from public funds - what is your view towards the Bill and its implementation?

ADI PATERSON: I think the Bill is in its final phases now. I think the challenge is to make sure that it is enabling in nature - that people who contribute intellectual property feel they’re going to benefit down stream, that institutions are given great flexibility to use intellectual property. The obligations people should have is to be responsible in declaring it - and making sure that when they do declare it that it’s properly used for everybody’s benefit, or if there is specific commercial benefit that it’s well defined.

STEPHAN LAMPRECHT: In your own experience in the current environment where you work - and we will dig into that a little bit more now - what is the role of the culture of innovation, and the support system of aspiring to patenting and so on - what role does that play over and above the hard and fast rules that we have in terms of the regulations and policies?

ADI PATERSON: It’s absolutely essential to recognise that knowledge workers have to feel creative - they have to feel they’re given space to be creative, and when they are creative they want to be taken seriously as the people who’ve contributed to that knowledge. So it’s creating an environment in which people see intellectual property as valuable - and something that is valuable to them in their career development in terms of their own goals and objectives. That’s absolutely essential. Scientists and engineers in this country have been trained to think of themselves as generally adding to public knowledge - and that’s extremely unfortunate because one of the key functions of public research and the use of public money is in fact to create value in the economy as well. So we have to continuously work in creating this positive and enabling culture. It’s go to be easy for people to patent, and when they do patent they need to be rewarded soon after they do that, and when big financial returns come - and it doesn’t come that often - we need to make sure they are able to benefit from the knowledge they’ve created.

STEPHAN LAMPRECHT: Being a scientist yourself what is the role of recognition in that incentivising process? Is it just a monetary thing, or is it also about giving recognition for the good ideas that have come forth?

ADI PATERSON: I think we’ve got to reinforce recognition at every stage - right from the idea formation stage and the possibility that an invention has been made, to the securing of the patent. It’s tough work putting a patent together so people need to be taken through that with the feeling that there is real recognition - it cannot just be an instructional process. So I believe we still need in many of our institutions to create that positive culture. The PBMR Company has got about 700 people - 600 technical people - and we have to ensure that those people feel they’re part of an inventive process, and when it’s strategically important to secure that by patents that they can fully participate in a positive way.

STEPHAN LAMPRECHT: You’ve implemented processes for patenting within the PBMR process - can you tell us a little bit more? If I understand it correctly PBMR is a very knowledge intensive environment - a lot of scientists and a lot of engineers - how do you manage the dynamic of know-how and extracting intellectual property from that know-how?

ADI PATERSON: Basically to be successful in the nuclear business you have to control certain core technologies. That’s a complicated thing to do because you also have to declare a lot of your intellectual property in order to demonstrate that your reactor is safe. So the strategies for protection are quite complex - because you don’t want to spend lots of money protecting something that is part of your safety case. You have to have something that is protectable over the long term. We work very intensively to determine what that is - part of that is kept as trade secrets, and part of that we patent as part of our marketing process to show that we command certain technologies in the PBMR space. We currently have 11 patent families that we are developing - and they range right from fuel systems to reactor core systems, and a number of other areas. I’m hoping that in the very near future we will get into digital controls for nuclear - because that’s a very hot area of patenting as well. So one has to have a strategy - you have to have focus areas - and don’t spend scarce resources trying to secure control of intellectual property that’s part of your safety case.

STEPHAN LAMPRECHT: As a last comment a lot of this doesn’t just extend to for example patents and so forth - but some of your engineers going to a conference and giving a presentation, and controlling that disclosure of information - how do you deal with that?

ADI PATERSON: We’ve got very careful processes - our chief technology officer has to clear every talk that is given, and he is well aware of the issues of what needs to be secured or not secured. Finally of course we use conferences as a way of marketing rather than disclosing.