Kim Yong-rae, Commissioner of the Korean Intellectual Property Office, "In the era of technological hegemony, intellectual property is competitiveness... The KIPO will fulfill its role"

Commissioner Kim Yong-rae of the Korean Intellectual Property Office introduced the KIPO's response strategy in the global technology hegemony competition structure during an interview with Asia Economy on the 17th. Photo by KIPO

[Asia Economy (Daejeon) Reporter Jeong Il-woong] As the US-China technological hegemony competition intensifies and the pace of digital transformation accelerates, the importance of intellectual property is growing. Especially in advanced core technology fields such as semiconductors and artificial intelligence, fierce competition among allied countries for securing core technologies and technological blockades is unfolding, increasing the role of the Korean Intellectual Property Office (KIPO). We heard about KIPO Commissioner Kim Yong-rae’s response strategy for the era of the 4th Industrial Revolution.

◆ Strategy to survive in the competition for technological hegemony = Commissioner Kim stated, “In the major countries’ policy trends for securing technological hegemony, the US has embarked on decoupling future technologies from China and restructuring supply chains for semiconductors, batteries, pharmaceuticals, and rare earths. China has also expanded its national R&D budget by more than 7% annually through aggressive investments against the US. Besides the US and China, countries worldwide have already entered the competition to secure core technologies and establish technological blockades in response to the 4th Industrial Revolution era. For example, neighboring Japan is building partnerships with the US in AI, quantum, life sciences, and space sectors to pursue technological blockades,” he analyzed.

In this external environment, Commissioner Kim’s theory is that a ‘Know thy enemy and know thyself’ strategy is necessary for South Korea to survive. First, it is essential to analyze which technology fields will be the core of the hegemony struggle, assess our technological level in those fields, and seek ways to effectively utilize strengths while compensating for weaknesses. He emphasized that when this is combined with execution power backed by implementation capability, South Korea can gain a relative advantage in the technological hegemony era competition.

Above all, Kim foresees that the proper utilization of patent information will be a prerequisite for securing core patents and establishing strategies to avoid patent competition with neighboring countries. To this end, KIPO increased its patent-based R&D (IP-R&D) projects and supporting budget from 690 projects and 38.5 billion KRW last year to 695 projects and 40 billion KRW. This means expanding patent analysis to derive promising R&D projects and strengthening support for patent-based R&D to secure foundational and core patents.

◆ Intellectual property protection measures in advanced core technology fields = The key issue in global technological hegemony competition is the preemption and protection of advanced technologies. Commissioner Kim said, “We will establish a system to identify and preempt core technologies by utilizing intellectual property data.” He explained, “To support the nationwide use of intellectual property data, we plan to enact the ‘Industrial Property Information Management and Utilization Promotion Act’ as a legal basis.”

He also emphasized, “We will expand big data analysis of patents in leading and new industry sectors to identify core technologies of national importance and focus on creating conditions for domestic companies to secure excellent patents and preempt core technologies.”

There is also a plan to strengthen efforts to prevent the leakage of major domestic technologies overseas and build a strong protection system that fairly rewards companies’ innovation efforts.

Commissioner Kim said, “We will also prepare measures to proactively protect new types of intellectual property emerging from the digital transformation, such as trademarks and designs within the metaverse and unfair competition acts related to Non-Fungible Tokens (NFTs).”

He added, “Above all, NFTs, along with the metaverse, are considered core elements of the future digital economy, and the related market is rapidly expanding. KIPO has launched an expert consultative body to analyze and review the impact of NFTs on intellectual property and plans to conduct policy research projects in the future.”

◆ Protection measures for socially vulnerable groups in the intellectual property field = First, KIPO expanded its technology police personnel from 15 to 22 last year and launched a dedicated organization to prevent the leakage and infringement of major technologies, which are core to national competitiveness. Recently, in cooperation with the National Intelligence Service, they investigated the leakage of trade secrets from domestic mid-sized companies, arresting seven people including overseas company brokers, achieving a preemptive block on the overseas leakage of core semiconductor production equipment technologies.

Along with protection measures for core technologies that will become key national assets, KIPO is also enhancing its capabilities to protect the intellectual property rights of socially vulnerable groups.

Commissioner Kim said, “Cases like ‘Deopjuk’ (a social issue recently) show that imitation trademark applications that free-ride on the credit built by small business owners frequently occur, causing damage to small business owners. Most victims realize the need for trademark registration only after damage occurs, and even if they recognize the need, many small business owners fail to secure trademark rights due to cost burdens and time constraints.”

Accordingly, KIPO plans to provide basic intellectual property education for small business owners through 13 Intellectual Property Centers nationwide, including Seoul, Gyeonggi, and Incheon, and promote support measures that combine intellectual property application costs and consulting, Commissioner Kim explained.

KIPO has also expanded the scope of intellectual property rights by establishing a legal basis to protect the economic value of celebrities’ portraits and names. This became possible with the amendment of the Unfair Competition Prevention Act, and the ‘Publicity Rights Protection System’ will be implemented from June 7.

The Publicity Rights Protection System provides a legal basis to sanction unauthorized use of celebrities’ portraits and names, and KIPO will be able to conduct administrative investigations from the system’s implementation date.

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.