Anti Copying In Design (ACID) welcomes and fully supports the ambitions of the ten-year Industrial Strategy. The Government aims, “To increase business investment and grow the industries of the future in the UK. The Strategy will make it quicker and easier for business to invest and will provide the certainty and stability needed for long-term investment decisions.” Full Strategy here.

We are encouraged with the government’s focus on IP as a critical engine for innovation to ensure that IP creators are recompensed and investors encouraged to support new ideas. Access to IP-access funds and ways in which to become ‘IP savvy’ to commercialise ideas will better exploit IP assets will encourage IP creators. The Intellectual Property Office (UKIPO) says it will streamline its digital access to ensure filing efficiency and, together with international support and training, this will reinforce IP’s role in economic growth and global competitiveness. ACID is fully supportive of the IP attache network and has already created plans to bolster IP engagement to UK firms working broad with a programme of further engagement.

The Professional and Business Services Plan pays a couple of references to the importance of IP as well. You can view it here.

Eight sectors in the UK are prioritised including the Creative Industries Sector Plan – GOV.UK, in which IP issues will play a central role in supporting innovation, protecting creators’ rights, and promoting economic growth. “We will ensure a copyright regime that values and protects human creativity, can be trusted, and unlocks new opportunities for innovation across the creative sector and wider economy.” The government wants to support rightsholders in licensing their work in the digital age while allowing AI developers to benefit from access to creative material in the United Kingdom. “The right approach here will unlock new opportunities for innovation across the whole economy.” The government is analysing responses to the consultation on delivering a copyright and AI framework, looking at all options. The government recognises the need for this to be done properly and carefully in a considered, measured, and reasoned way, to develop any future proposals.

The government will set out a detailed economic impact assessment on all options under consideration and a report on the use of copyright material for AI training, transparency, and technical standards. This analysis will inform the government’s position, alongside a series of expert working groups to bring together people from both the AI and creative sectors on the issues of transparency, licensing, and other technical standards to chart a way forward.

“We will establish a Creative Content Exchange (CCE) to be a trusted marketplace for selling, buying, licensing, and enabling permitted access to digitised cultural and creative assets.”

This new marketplace will open up new revenue streams and allow content owners to commercialise and financialise their assets while providing data users with ease of access. In this way, the CCE will help fuel the next wave of creative innovation while facilitating the development of high-value AI models. Discovery and testing of appropriate models and technologies

“We will make UK IP rights the best protected in the world, setting a gold enforcement standard in the UK and internationally to protect rights owned by UK businesses.”

The UKIPO is working towards delivering this vision, including by promoting the UK’s policy approach globally and strengthening resilience to IP infringement abroad. The Government’s domestic policy decision to maintain the UK’s bespoke exhaustion of IP rights regime (UK+ regime) has supported the sector and ensured that UK businesses can freely import and export IP-protected goods without additional rights-holder permission, directly impacting trade flows and pricing.

However, whilst fully supportive, the IP plans still do come with a set of pros, cons, and challenges which we summarise as follows:

Pros: Highlighting the protection of creators’ rights to ensure that creators retain control over their work and are compensated fairly will encourage investment into new content, designs, and ideas if there is confidence about unauthorised use. Economic Growth and Revenue Generation will be helped to grow by licensing, royalties, and commercial exploitation, contributing to GDP and employment. Establishing and strengthening links with countries with robust IP strategies will contribute to global competitiveness. Registering and building recognisable brands and designs will command high value in the market.

Cons: Pitted against the above is the high cost of protection and access to cost effective enforcement is a challenge for lone, micro and SME creators. Against a backcloth of many SMEs being unaware of how to become IP savvy, this may lead to underutilisation or loss of rights. The large divide between monopolisation and in equality of large businesses dominating the Ip landscape cannot be ignore, often being played out in David against Goliath issues. There still remains a dichotomy between traditional IP frameworks and the fast-paced creation of untethered content creation.

Threats: Real challenges remain with digital piracy and infringement which do not make enforcement easy. Together with the inconsistent and access to equal laws across jurisdictions can make cross border IP management out of reach for most SMEs. Emerging technologies challenge the traditional understanding of authorship, originality, and ownership.

Dids Macdonald OBE, Director of Public Affairs, Campaigning and IP Policy said, “The government’s plans for careful AI regulation are welcome, including impact assessments and transparency measures. However, as these develop slowly, generative AI continues to infringe on copyright unchecked, at an unstoppable pace. Policymakers must be nimbler to address the urgent concerns of the creative industries and protect our precious IP from ongoing misuse.”

The Intellectual Property section is on page 17-18. The trade and export section are also on page 27, which focuses on increasing exports of creative goods and services. 

The Professional and Business Services Plan pays a couple of references to the importance of Intellectual Property as well. You can view it here: Industrial Strategy: Professional and Business Services Sector Plan

See pages 7 and 31, which references a new funding working group. It considers steps to address regulatory and non-regulatory barriers to lending to IP-rich SMEs and commits to a plan by the end of the year. This is also mentioned in the Digital and Technologies  Sector Plan on page 16.