Deputy Minister Vu Duc Dam: Vietnam should strike for ranking the 2nd in ASEAN in intellectual property

This is one of guidance Deputy Prime Minister Vu Duc Dam emphasized in the working session with the National Office of Intellectual Property (NOIP) – the Ministry of Science and Technology (MOST) on the current situation and development solutions of NOIP for the coming period, in the morning of September 29, 2016.

In addition to Deputy Prime Minister Vu Duc Dam, attending the working session were the member of the Central Party, Minister of Science and Technology Chu Ngoc Anh; Leaders of the Ministry of Finance, Leaders of the Ministry of Home Affairs; the Office of the Government together with representatives of relevant agencies under MOST.


Each year the number of applications increases 10%

Reporting in the working session, Deputy Minister of Science and Technology, concurrently the Director of NOIP Tran Viet Thanh mentioned many remarkable results. Among which he emphasized the legal system on Intellectual Property (IP).

“Currently Vietnam’s legal system on IP has been higher that the world’s standard levels. Vietnam’s legal system on protection and enforcement of IP rights has been not only at WTO’s minimum standards but also higher than those set out in the Bilateral Trade Agreement signed with the US. Vietnam’s legal system on IP can be compared with those of advanced countries in the region and are being moved towards the world’s advanced standards according to commitments on criteria in favor of right owners.” – Deputy Minister Tran Viet Thanh affirmed.

Deputy Minister Tran Viet Thanh also mentioned one fact that authentication of industrial property right has been one of key tasks of the Office and it has become heavier and heavier because the number of applications for industrial property increased quickly (around 10% on the average). Only in the last 5 years (from 2011 to 2015), the Office received 390,876 applications for IP right protection or orders of all types, among which 338,387 applications were handled, accounting for 86.7% of the total numbers of received qualifications, 132,107 certificates of Industrial Property Protection was granted, including 6,028 patents with exclusive rights, 466 patents of useful solutions, 6,648 patents of industrial designs and 118,922 certificates of brand names and 23 certificates of geographical instructions.


Although making efforts and achieving many remarkable results, Deputy Minister Tran Viet Thanh mentioned barriers as policies and laws on IP has currently handled professional issues on IP protection and enforcement but they are not synchronically in line with relevant laws as Law on S&T, Law on Technology Transfer; delays in administrative procedure reform and simplification of processes of industrial property authentication; some regulations are not detailed and clear enough, leading to delays and barriers in appraising applications, for example some applications of pharmaceutical patents with issues of usage patents; infrastructure, especially information technology infrastructure, database, searching tools, equipment.

Causes leading to the situation clearly mentioned by Deputy Minister Tran Viet Thanh were the lack of human resources to process the applications and facilities, techniques were lacked and backward; financial resources were limited due to the fact that a part of the fee and charges were allocated to keep by the Office (70%) while Vietnam’s fees and charges were too low in comparison to those of other countries and couldn’t cover enough for appraising applications for industrial property because the fees and charges were kept the same for many years. For example, fees for appraising applications for patents, Vietnam’s average fee was VND 1,260,000 while that of Malaysia was VD 5,862,000 (4.7 times higher than Vietnam’s), that of Philippines was VND 1,642,000 (1.3 times higher), and that of Singapore was VND 41,288,000 (32.8 times higher); the quality of auxiliary systems as the system of industrial property representatives was not high and the quality of applications prepared by industrial property representatives was not at standard levels.

Reforms in working ways, Vietnam needs to achieve breakthroughs in IP

After hearing the presentation, the Deputy Prime Minister requested agencies under NOIP - the office directly in charge of daily operations to present current difficulties and barriers as well as solutions to overcome. The biggest desire the Deputy Prime Minster emphasized to promote more appraisals, processing and issuing of protection certificates in order to contribute to speeding up Vietnam’s patents as well as supporting activities for IP protection of organizations, individuals and businesses.

From ideas mentioned current difficulties, key issues are human resources and infrastructure faced with the number of applications which have not been solved timely over the past time.


Sharing about these difficulties, the Deputy Prime Minister proposed that firstly leaders and all staff and laborers of NOIP should understand their responsibilities. Then they should be creative from the simplest work and work in a clear and transparent manner so that the work would be carried out better.

From the fact of unsolved applications, the Deputy Prime Minister requested NOIP to make changes in order to establish good and well-arranged database. Especially it is necessary to learn from the world’s experience, search and recognition of results of other countries to reduce time for processing applications.

It is sure that for the coming time, the number of applications sent to NOIP will be increased faster while the number of managers and appraisers can’t increase accordingly. Therefore, the necessity of reforming working ways as well establishing systematic and IT applied processes has been emphasized by the Deputy Prime Minster.

The Deputy Prime Minister affirmed that the Government would guide relevant Ministries and branches to solve difficulties with hopes to promote IP protection and enforcement.

The Deputy Prime Minister has believed that when every small service and step can be registered on line, it will certainly contribute to promoting IP activities.

“Vietnam’s national innovation system then will be improved. It is determined that by 2020 Vietnam would strive for ranking the 2nd in ASEAN in term of the intellectual property” – the Deputy Prime Minister affirmed.

With the Deputy Prime Minister’s guidance, Minister Chu Ngoc Anh agreed and said the Ministry together with NOIP would positively solve specific issues with spirits of using new approaches to handle work. Regarding the Ministry’s authority as amending circulars, every step and process, most important and core issues would be reviewed in order to improve and promote IP activities, meeting practical demands.

It is known that one of the coming solutions NOIP will move towards is to strengthen its investment in the development of modern information technology system. According one of the four recommendations made by NOIP to the Government is “To allow in principle the Office to rent the information technology infrastructure; and have the direct appointment of Viettel as bidder for the Office’s information technology development activities”. The Deputy Prime Minister supported and agreed with this recommendation./.