IP Scout Initiative Kicks of in Chemistry and Electrical Engineering
The concept of "IP Scouts" has been developed by RCIPS and is aimed at providing researchers in specific departments with a person within their department who is knowledgeable about IP management practices at UCT and who can speak to them in their own 'technical language'.
The IP Scouts will be engaging with staff and postgraduate students to raise the level of IP awareness and to identify protectable IP so that timeous action can be taken to file a provisional patent when warranted, ahead of publication, so that both patenting and publishing objectives can be achieved.
This will become increasingly important with the introduction of the new IP Rights from Publicly Funded Research Bill that is anticipated to come into force during 2009.
The IP Scouts will provide a 'first point of call' for the department on intellectual property issues and UCT's procedures and the IP Scouts have been provided with detailed information via a series of seminars that they have attended.
Should you want to learn more about the IP Scout initiative, please contact Dr. Andrew Bailey.