Reaching Dynamic Trajectories Towards SDG Implementation

Southeast Asia (SEA), now the world’s fifth largest economy, is on track to become the fourth largest by 2030. This growing and strategically placed engine of ideas, technology and trade has seen gross R&D expenditure surging five-fold, crossing over USD 50 billion, in the past two decades. This attests to the region’s appetite and attractiveness as a hub for creative and innovative technological developments.

Largely as a result, SEA has surged ahead in the generation and uptake of frontier technologies and cutting-edge tools -- with Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand and Viet Nam leading the charge. Together, these countries account for 99.8% of all inventions originating from the region.

Regional breakthroughs in invention are particularly notable in medical technologies, pharmaceutical innovations and creative healthcare solutions tailored to meet regional needs.  They are also equally significant in digital technology, spanning across Computer Technology, Digital Communications, and Telecommunications fields.

All those milestones of creativity and innovation have spearheaded wide-ranging progress and advances towards the realization of SDGs -- particularly those concerning SDG 3 (Good Health and Well-Being), SDG 9 (Industry, Innovation and Infrastructure), SDG 11 (Sustainable Cities and Communities), and SDG 13 (Climate Action).

The report on Southeast Asia Patent Landscape serves to celebrate this year’s World IP Day, themed as IP and the SDGs: Building our common future with innovation and creativity. It unravels the dynamics and insights specifically as regards the region’s wide-ranging breakthroughs and contributions to collective global efforts in achieving the SDGs. In particular, it covers the related patenting trends across technological fields such as digital and medical technologies and tools, while highlighting both homegrown and cross-border collaboration in the process.

Indeed, creativity and innovation in SEA have largely embodied a fusion of regional and foreign ingenuity driven by a dynamic blend of local research institutes and external entities.  These institutes have supplied a rich and widening local talent pool that attracts foreign partners and stakeholders to establish regional research and business operations. The same process has also stimulated the capabilities of homegrown companies, many of which have become active creators and innovators in their own right and on a global scale.

The report is produced by IPOS International, under the ambit of the Memorandum of Understanding between WIPO and the Government of Singapore. Since its inception in 2005, the MoU has delivered a myriad of programs and activities to promote IP awareness, to strengthen IP capabilities, and to foster IP use and leverage in countries in SEA and beyond. The WIPO-Singapore partnership continues to forge collaborations on creative and innovative fields and topics that will enable the region to maximise the value of IP and other intangible assets for sustainable and broad-based economic growth and social development, now and into the future.