This is a guest contribution from Mike Lloyd of Patent-Insights. Further details about the author can be found at the end of the article.
COVID-19 has had many devastating impacts all around the world, both in terms of fatalities and other health impacts, and also in economic terms. While the economic impact is yet to be fully understood, it has led to significant drops in GDP activity in many countries. In Australia, the drop in GDP due to COVID-19 has been estimated to be 7%.
But how has this affected IP activity – particularly in relation to intellectual property rights (IPR) filed in Australia, and filed globally by Australian IP owners?
Mark Summerfield has considered this in relation to patents being filed in Australia in recent blogs, and found a 5% decline, which is in line with the drop in GDP, and the largest fall over a comparable time period since the GFC . This study is intended to consider more international aspects, if from an Australian perspective, and also to consider registered designs and trade marks.