The Japan Patent Office and The Small and Medium Enterprise Agency Strengthen Collaboration

In order to support the acquisition and utilization of intellectual property rights for small and medium sized enterprises (SMEs) in Japan, the Japan Patent Office and The Small and Medium Enterprise Agency have decided to strengthen their cooperation between one another.

The Small and Medium Enterprise Agency established the "Yorozu Support Center" in all prefectures in Japan and the center provides business consultations for small and medium enterprises and Japanese micro entities. Concurrently, the JPO also provides consultation and service counters in all prefectures that are dedicated to helping SMEs commercialize their ideas and link them to overseas development.

Until now, the JPO also has been trying to coordinate with both support systems so that SME business representatives who visited the "Yorozu Support Center" would also be provided with support from the people at the commercialization service counter associated with the Japan Patent Office; however, thus far the specific goals from this collaborative effort have not yet been achieved.

In response to this situation, the Japanese Patent Office aims to raise the number of consultations to more than double from the 700 cases that both parties were able to handle in 2015 to 1,500 cases by 2019. As part of this process the JPO has urged the Chief Coordinator of all of the support centers in Japan to strengthen cooperation.

The proportion of Japanese small and medium enterprises accounts for 99.7% of domestic enterprises. However, the number of domestic patent applications filed by small and medium enterprises is only about 14%, and the number of foreign patent applications filed is only about 16%. Going forward, the JPO hopes this cooperative effort will protect the intellectual property and overseas expansion of SMEs, and will stimulate the areas outside Tokyo.