IP Protection Commitment In US Innovation Strategy

America’s “economic growth has rested for too long on an unstable foundation,” and it is now necessary to “redouble our efforts to give our world-leading innovators every chance to succeed,” reads the text of a White House innovation strategy that President Obama presented yesterday at Hudson Valley Community College in Troy, New York.

The strategy says “intellectual property is to the digital age what physical goods were to the industrial age,” and says that the US must ensure IP protection in foreign markets. It also calls for “greater cooperation on international standards that allow our technologies to compete everywhere.” It further asserts a commitment to the US Patent and Trademark Office that they will have the resources and flexibility they need to administer the patent system, and mentions the president’s interest in patent reform.

The innovation strategy, whose full text is available here [pdf] with a three page summary available here [pdf], addresses the need to stimulate the American economy through creativity with a three tiered strategy.

The 3-part strategy includes: first, investments in “the building blocks of American innovation,” such as funding for basic research and development, as well as initiatives to improve education, infrastructure and access to the internet; second, the promotion of markets that encourage creative entrepreneurship; and third, a focus on particularly critical areas – including environmental improvements in energy creation and in vehicle technology and innovations in health care – in the hopes of catalysing breakthroughs.