Panelists
discussed the importance of supporting IP-based sectors, promoting IP
awareness, and enforcing strong IP rights in the contexts of business
innovation, consumer safety, and economic development domestically and
worldwide.
Mark
Crowell, Executive Director of U.Va. Innovations, reported that three-fourths
of new jobs in the U.S. economy are in entrepreneurial companies founded on
inventions that come out of universities, which demonstrates the importance of
investing in research and education. For instance, U.Va. Innovations alone has
created nearly 900 local jobs, brought 342 products to development or to market,
and generated $329 million in external funding and $14 million in sponsored
research.
On a
national scale, IP-driven industries provide 55.7 million jobs, 35% of U.S.
GDP, and three-fourths of the nation’s exports. The impact of IP in the U.S. is
valued at over $5 trillion. And, half of the economic growth in the U.S.
economy takes place in industries that did not exist even ten years ago. These
impacts clearly show that innovation drives economic development, and entrepreneurs
and creators who rely heavily on IP protection for their products create jobs,
attract investment to local and national markets, and make valuable
contributions to the information economy.
Panelists
lauded accomplishments like these, but cautioned that IP-based industries can
only create value if investors and innovators can rely on the safeguards of IP
rights to protect their works, and also to help ensure that creators will be
able to recoup returns on investment. Representatives from the National
Football League (NFL), U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ), and the National IPR
Coordination Center (IPR Center) discussed their efforts to prevent
counterfeit products from reaching the market. They explained that piracy and
counterfeiting have become much more sophisticated and global in nature and
coordination between public and private entities and among nations worldwide
must increase.
The U.S.
loses over $250 billion each year to counterfeit products and global piracy; IP
infringement is one of the biggest sources of drain to the economy. But there
are some success stories. For example, the IPR, jointly with other federal
agencies, international and local law enforcement, and private companies
disrupted a massive sports counterfeiting ring involving arrests of 70 people,
shuttering more than 5,000 counterfeiting websites, and seizing $37
million-worth of fake NFL merchandise in New York and New Jersey. The scale of
these operations and the potential loss to the U.S. economy demonstrate the
importance of helping promote, protect, and enforce IP rights.
While
the financial impact of IP-based industries provides a clear reason to protect
IP, the IP protection is embedded in the foundational values our country was
built upon. Mark Crowell noted that our founding fathers recognized the value
of the useful arts. He observed that Thomas Jefferson founded the patent office
and was an inventor himself, and he quoted the former President who stated, “Wherever
an invention proves useful it ought to be tried.” Congressman Doug Collins of
the 9th District of Georgia noted that IP was so important to our Founders
that it was enshrined in the constitution. He explained that although we are in
the midst of fundamental change in our society, moving from tangible to
digital, the property right and value of an intangible idea and innovations are
no less important than the proverbial bundle of sticks.
David
Lowery, Musician and Guest Lecturer at the University of Georgia’s Terry
College of Business, discussed how songwriters are among the original authors
clearly protected by IP rights. He drew a comparison between songwriters and
poets and innovators and entrepreneurs, suggesting that these groups are the "garage
tinkerers." They are the creators that have always recognized, unlike many
people today, that you do not have to choose between protecting IP and
embracing new ideas or creating new innovations or technologies.
Finally,
as Congressman Collins said, “strong IP protections are not a hindrance to
creation but are the very spark for innovation… From healthcare, to technology,
to poetry, it all starts with a creative spark,” these are all products of an
intangible idea that comes from the individual that is valuable, “property that
comes from within.” The only way to incentivize further creation, as our
Founders recognized, is to provide protection for intangible property, the
fruits of man’s labor, through strong IP rights.
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