Indian Patents in Biotechnology

 

S. Visalakshi

 

Patenting activity in India in the area of biotechnology (BT) is captured in this section. Data from the Indian Patent Office (IPO) journal formed the base for a descriptive analysis of patenting in Biotechnology during 2001-07. The data of patents published are identified to be falling under Biotechnology using the 1PC codes, which were selected by OECD in 2004. The data for 2004 was not available in the database referred above and hence not included in the present analysis.  The analysis of the data has shown the following salient features:

 

Salient Features

1. No of Patents filed, published and granted in all fields have increased continuously during 2001-07.

 

Table 1: Patents Filed Published and Granted During 2001-07

Status  of Patents

2001-02

2002-03

2003-04

2004-05

2005-06

2006-07

Filed

 

11466

12613

17466

24505

28940

Published

 

9538

10709

14813

11569

14119

Granted

 

1379

2469

1911

4320

7539

Source: Annual Report 2007 of Indian Patent Office (IPO)

 

2. Among fields related to Biotechnology there is no general increase in food patents, unlike the scenario for chemicals and drugs.

 

Table 2: Patents Published During 02-03 to 06-07 in Various Fields

Year

Chemical

Drugs

Food

2002-03

776

966

119

2003-04

2952

2525

123

2004-05

3916

2316

190

2005-06

5810

2211

101

2006-07

6350

3239

101

Source: Annual Report 2007 of Indian Patent Office (IPO)

 

3. The proportion of biotech patents in all patents published is <3%. There is an increase in number of BT patents during 2001-07. But increase of Indian component is not significant.

 


Fig1: Number of Patents and Indian Contribution in Biotechnology

 

4. There have been patents in Biotechnology whose applicants hail from both India and abroad, since 1980’s.

 

Table 3: Number of applications by country

Year

Domestic applications

 

Foreign applications

Subtotal

Private

MNC

Univ.

Public

Ind.

Others

Subtotal

U.S.A.

Germany

U.K.

Japan

France

Others

All sector

1980

1,178

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

1,776

570

274

210

96

133

493

1985

999

 

 

 

 

 

 

2,527

968

277

278

140

188

676

1990

1,180

 

 

 

 

 

 

2,584

1,130

294

230

134

150

646

1991

1,293

 

 

 

 

 

 

2,259

1,013

229

202

122

114

579

1992

1,228

 

 

 

 

 

 

2,239

995

317

164

94

106

563

1993

1,264

 

 

 

 

 

 

2,605

1,136

346

209

126

104

684

1994

1,741

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

3,589

1,528

430

310

218

155

948

1995

1,606

 

 

 

 

 

 

5,430

2,239

676

405

431

242

1,437

1996

1,661

 

 

 

 

 

 

6,901

2,537

1,080

494

702

288

1,800

1997

1,926

 

 

 

 

 

 

8,229

3,000

1,297

589

844

380

2,119

1998

2,247

 

 

 

 

 

 

6,707

2,807

912

401

688

351

1,548

Total

16,323

 

 

 

 

 

 

44,846

17,923

6,132

3,492

3,595

2,211

11,493

Biotechnology

1980

3

 

 

1

2

 

 

 

3

1

 

 

 

2

 

1985

10

3

2

 

3

1

1

34

9

2

2

3

3

15

1990

39

1

5

 

28

2

3

46

16

4

6

1

4

15

1991

41

3

5

 

25

3

5

38

17

2

2

3

3

11

1992

42

3

2

1

28

5

3

44

15

8

2

2

4

13

1993

62

3

6

 

29

11

13

69

32

7

6

3

2

19

1994

111

41

3

1

44

14

8

60

20

6

2

3

2

27


5. Number of domestic patents in Biotechnology has increased from 126 during 2001-03 to 181 during 2005-07. The BT patents by domestic applications were more (~ 3 times) than patents by foreign applicants during 2001-03. The trend reversed during 2005-07 when BT patents by Indians formed only 12 of all the patents. This drastic change in the proportion of Indian vs. Foreign patents in Bt could be seen in the table below.

 

Table 4: Proportion of Indian Foreign BT Patents 2001-07

Year

Indian

Foreign

Total

2001-2003

126

47

173

2005-2007

181

1302

1530

Total

307

1349

1656


6. The number of countries contributing has increased over the year during 2001-07. This fact explains the increase in number of patents during this period to a limited extent.

Fig 2: Countries involved in Patenting in BT in India

 

7. Major countries applying for Indian BT patents were led by USA. India occupies 2nd position. These two were followed by Netherlands, Germany, UK, Denmark, and Switzerland.

 

Table 5: Country wise Distribution of Patents in Biotechnology published in Gazette of India

Name of Country

Year in which published

2001

2002

2003

2005

2006

2007

USA

3

5

14

242

125

162

India

26

21

80

87

64

53

Netherlands

1

1

0

24

1

28

Germany

2

1

2

97

21

26

Britain

0

2

1

44

26

19

Denmark

0

0

1

71

1

17

Switzerland

0

3

4

42

12

14

 

Nature of Applicants for Indian BT Patents:  

8. Basically three types of institutions apply for patents in biotechnology: universities & public research institutions, private (profit oriented) companies, and non-profit organizations & research foundations. Their behavior, during the period 2001-2007, can be observed in Table 6. Though the number of patents by private companies had increased during 2005-07, they have not surpassed the contribution by the public institutions. The situation is different in the case of foreign patentees. There is a significant increase in the number of patents by private companies. The public institutions who hardly featured during 2001-03 as applicants, managed to post many patents (even more than their Indian counterparts), during 2005-07.

 

Table 6: Nature of Institutions from India and abroad contributing to BT Patents in India

Year

Domestic

Foreign

Private

Public

Others

Total

Private

Public

Others

Total

2001

9

17

0

26

3

1

0

4

2002

3

14

3

20

17

2

0

19

2003

16

61

3

80

22

1

1

24

2005

27

34

7

68

627

5656

2020

703

2006

15

36

7

58

204

25

14

243

2007

1 8

24

13

55

316

39

1

356

Total

98

176

33

307

1189

124

36

1349

 

9. The contribution of public vs. private institutions among Indian and foreign applicants for 2001-07 is given below:

Indian          Public: Private       68:32

Foreign        Public: Private       12:88

 

Of the total patents, 77% come from the private applicants, while public research institutions contribute a mere 19%. Remaining 4% patents are applied for by individuals and nonprofit organizations. The countries that contribute in a big way, together, have a share of 80% of all patents published in BT during the period under study. Of these top five countries (USA, India, Germany, UK and Denmark) have 73% contribution. When the contributions from Switzerland and the Netherlands are added to the contribution by the top five countries, 81% of patents in BT are covered.

 

Fig 3: Patent distribution amongst leading countries

 

10. During 2001-07 the largest and most consistent contributor from India is CSIR. The trend of Indian applicants is presented in Figure 4. There is an increase in the number of applicants from India in this period. Increased interest of Indian companies in going for patents becomes evident when figures for 2005-07 are compared to those for 2001-03.

 

Fig 4: Patent seekers from India.

 

 

Focus of Indian Biotech Patents

11. Codes based distribution of patents published during 2001-07 shows that there is an increase in the number of patents that come under the IPC codes A61K. The codes C07K, C12Q have made significant and consistent appearance in the period 2005-07. This would mean that production related patents have increased in 2005-07. This corroborates with the observation that during this period more private industry applicants have applied for patents with Indian patent office (IPO).

 

Fig 5: Interest in Patents under different Code Categories (2001-07)

 

12. Based on the major codes of IPC relevant for Biotechnology (The list and description is available in Annexure) we find that the focus is more in A61k, C07k, C12N and C12Q. There is a slight shift in the focus from 90’s during 2000’s. A61K which was very prominent and the only specialization of focus during the 90’s became less prominent during 2000 and its place was occupied by C12N, C12Q and C07K (figure 5) [The data for 90’s is taken from earlier study of NISTADS].

 

13. Focus in terms of application in various areas like agriculture, industrial enzymes, healthcare and environment during 90’s and 2000 has shown that environmental BT patents (C20F) are very few and the importance given has not changed in the two periods. Health care BT patents, indicated by A61K, C07K, C12N, C12Q, G01N have been in focus. Though there is a change in their performance between them and during 90’s and 2000’s-prominence of codes C12N, C12, C12M, C12S indicate focus on Industrial BT involving enzymes. Of these C12S could also indicate healthcare related products; focus on this area has also increased nominally.  The codes indicating AO1H (Agriculture process of obtaining new plants and modifying genotypes) have not increased from the 90’s.

 

Fig 6: Patents under different Code Categories

 

14. From this trend it appears, Indian institutions as well as foreign applicants feel that there is a larger opportunity for health care BT related patents to be worked in India compared to industrial BT or Agri-biotechnology. Environmental Biotechnology does not seem to be in focus for applicants from India or abroad.

 

 

Conclusion

Patenting activity in India in BT has increased since the 90’s and significant increase in the number of patents has been observed during 2005-07. Patenting activity by a number of countries from outside India plays a dominant role, accounting for ~70% of BT patents. Then there is an increase in patent activity by Indian private sector as well. Significant increase in number of institutions, both private and public, from foreign countries has also been observed. The focus of patenting activity seems to be healthcare, followed by Industrial enzymes. Low level patenting activity is observed in the area of agriculture and environment.

 

 

Acknowledgement: Inputs in handling the patent databases from Ms. Himani Agarwal and Shri Varun Satia, trainees at NISTADS are duly acknowledged.

 

 

References:

 

 

Annexure 1

 

IPC codes identified by OECD to be related to Biotechnology

A01

Agriculture

A01H

New plants or process for obtaining them, Plant reproduction by tissue culture  tech(A01H4).

A01h1

Process of modifying  genotypes.

A61

Med. Or vet science ,Hygene.

A61K

Preparation  Medical dental or toilet.

A61K31

Med. Preparation containing organic actives ingridients .

A61K38

Med. Preparation containing peptides.

A61K39

Protozoa antigens.

A61K48

Med. Preparation containing genetics material which is inserted into ells of living body to treat genetic disease, gene therapy.

C07K

Peptides.

C07K 4/00

Pep. having  up to 20 amino acids in undefined sequence and erivations.

C11N

Single cell proteins, enzymes, gene engg. Process for obtaining pep.

C12Q

Compute for measuring or testing processes involving enzymes.

C12Q14/00

Prep. C>20 amino acids gastuins,somatostatins, melano tropins: erivatives there of.

C12Q16/00

Immuno globalius-MCAS& poly antibodies.

C12Q19/00

Hybrid peptides.

C12M

Apparatus for enzymology & miciiiobiol.

C12N

Microorganisms or enzyme composition these of (biocides etc)

C12P

Fermentation oe enzyme using process to synthesizer a designed cpd/ omposition etc.

C12Q

Measuring or testing process involving enzymes or micro  organisms.

C12S

Processes using enzyme or microorganisms to separate liberate or urifying a pre existing Cpd or composition.

G01N27/327

Investigating or analyzing using biochemical electrodes.

G01n33

Investigating or analyzing materials by specific methods not covered in receding groups.

G01n33/48

Biological material.

G01n33/53

Immunoassays.

G01n33/54

Second antibody

G01n33/68

Involving peptides/proteins

G01n33/74

Involving hormones.

G01n33/78

Thyroid hormones

G01n33/88

Prostaglandin.

G01n33/92

Involving lipids /cholesterol .

 

 

 

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