Commonwealth makes IP data available online

In a world first, the Australian Government has announced it will make 100 years of intellectual property (IP) rights data available online in order to make finding collaboration partners easier and allow the mapping of innovation.

The information being made available comprises more than 350 million data points - including rights to patents, trademarks, designs and plant breeders’ rights - and will be updated annually.

Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for Industry Bob Baldwin said this world-first move would help companies find each other more quickly to collaborate, build their product and get it to market.

“Placing IP rights data on the web in a way that is easily searchable will make it easier for business to come together to innovate, create jobs and boost our economy,” Baldwin said.

“The data includes information about IP rights applications that can be matched to individual firms along with information about their size, their technology and their geographic location.

“This data allows Australia to continue to encourage the collaboration and innovation to help our nation be globally competitive into the future.”

This information also allows the government to map innovation and pinpoint exactly where new ideas have been developed in Australia, and by which companies.

This means that IP rights can be linked with geospatial data and business information. This information can be used to identify Australia’s growth sectors.

The Intellectual Property Government Open Data is available from www.data.gov.au.