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Will India become an IP hub anytime soon?

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CIOL Bureau
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BANGALORE, INDIA: Nasscom, the premier trade body and the voice of Indian software industry, has set its expectations high on India in the space of intellectual property (IP) development and protection.

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The organization believes that the Indian IT industry has to think beyond ‘services’ and focus more on product development. IP development should emerge as a key focus area in the coming years.

The two-day Nasscom Product Conclave, which ended here on Tuesday, ignited the efforts for the same.

Sharad Sharma, CEO, Yahoo India R&D, who chaired a panel discussion on the potential of India in the IP space, opined that India is at the same inflexion point where China was a decade ago in the development of IP. Certain domains in India have already emerged as significant IP contributors and the country has an opportunity to go further up the value chain.

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Huge opportunities in semicon

“There are huge opportunities in the areas of semiconductors, embedded systems, EDA tools, etc., and India needs to develop this ecosystem further and come up with newer innovations,” said Srini Rajam, CEO of Ittiam Systems.

“IP development needs to be more practical. It is important to go beyond mere algorithms and come up with reference designs, which has more resemblance to the end product. The end-user needs to be taken into consideration at the IP level itself;” he added.

Deepak Visweswariah, director, Information Management Group, EMC said that it is important for Indian IT companies to develop products for the local market.

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“India is definitely one of the prime countries and it can grow as IP hub sooner or later. But, at this point in time, there are not many examples of Indian companies developing IP targeting the growing local market whereas, there are certain MNC’s in India who have grown really well in the IP development space,” he elaborated.

Emerging technologies drive more IP

Mahesh Mehendale, chief technologist, Digital Entertainment, Texas Instruments said; “There are many segments in which India can emerge as an IP hub. Green electronics and power are two key areas, which will drive lots of IPs and designs. Power management and low power are areas with tremendous opportunities.”

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Medical electronics holds lot of potential as well to drive IP development. Today, there are efforts to use Internet for tele-medicine and bring in benefits for the rural population. Technologies help make high-end treatments cheaper. Lots of practical IP can be used in this area. Medical tourism also helps broaden the scope. This would act as a catalyst to drive more and more IP out of India.

Defense and consumer electronics are another areas where lots of IP would be required. However, when it comes to consumer electronics, IP development needs to be based on the adoption of the end product.

“The iPod is a good example. It is definitely not the first hard-drive based MP3 player. There were many before. But, Apple made the music content easily available with the help of iTunes. That was the innovation, which made iPod different, and not just a ‘me-too’ product;” explained Mahesh Mehendale.

Another factor which will help the country move forward in the innovation space is the contribution from the academia. India definitely has good universities where real ideas and innovations take place. Therefore, it is important to bridge the gap between the industry and the academia. This will ultimately help turn academic researches into end products.

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