Tpp Agreement Significant For Patent NZ Applications Say James & Wells
Tuesday 19 January 2016, 4:36PM
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James & Wells Intellectual Property Experts recently featured an article on their website at http://www.jaws.co.nz/about-us/media/article/why-australasia-should-be-on-your-patent-radar on the importance of the TPP Agreement to New Zealand and Australia. Traditionally, both countries are seen as being relatively small markets – not justifying the patent spend. The significance of the conclusion of the TPP negotiations cannot be over-emphasised and the team at James & Wells say this needs to be realised if overseas applicants don’t want to miss out on the game changer opportunities that TPP helps provide.
The article goes on to explain, “Most overseas companies don’t realise New Zealand and Australia are great places to do business for a multitude of reasons and the key advantages brought by TPP to Australian and New Zealand companies include:
•Easy access to new markets
•Reducing tariffs by over 90%
•Reducing business compliance costs
•Reducing trade barriers on services and investments
“Importantly, overseas companies, particularly of those based in jurisdictions outside the TPP deal, may consider using Australia and New Zealand’s as “ports” to gain access to and better navigate the trans-Pacific region. For New Zealand, in addition to the thriving primary industries, the Government is able to support rapid growth in sectors such as technology and food and beverage: through the Business Growth Agenda program, whilst investing $100 million over six years in 31 projects at New Zealand Universities, Crown Research Institutes and private research organisations.
“Furthermore, a New Zealand company has recently raised $400 million to build a submarine fibre optic cable network (expected to be operating by 2017) linking New Zealand, Australia and the United States.”
As the article concludes, that if overseas companies wish to take advantage of New Zealand and Australia’s great business environment, then the team at James & Wells recommend setting up joint ventures with local enterprises and filing patent applications in New Zealand and Australia to stop competitors from accessing these markets.
This article is the first (of a series) to explore why overseas applicants need to put Australasia on their patent filing map, so for future information on this subject please visit the James & Wells website at http://www.jaws.co.nz .