We talked, for example, about innovation bucks that exist in a number of countries—China, the U.K., France, and so on. They're incentivizing commercialization, getting the IP, commercializing the R and D, and so on. That is one aspect.
China also has a broader range of grants in terms of IP. It's also developing the culture. Jeff mentioned the importance of teaching about IP in high schools, universities, and so on. That's part of it too, developing that culture of innovation and a basic knowledge of IP.
That's why we see in the United States that there's a tremendous amount of patenting, and in China as well. In China, at first it was just the manufacturing, and more and more they have realized that they should own their IP as well. They're doing that much more.
It's a question of incentives, culture, legislation. We mentioned at the outset, for example, the privilege to protect communication with agents. On this, Canada was behind. It existed in other countries. That's part, as well, of building that culture and that framework wherein inventors and innovators are comfortable in thinking they should go get a patent or a trademark and hire an agent. They think that's what their neighbour is doing, that's what others are doing. They're comfortable that the system will work for them, that they won't be disadvantaged in court because they don't have that privilege while their American counterpart has it. It's things like that.
Those are things that we have been discussing over the years. Many improvements have been made. More could be done.
With regard to the framework, make sure it works, that it serves the innovators. Make sure people understand the importance of IP, of innovation, and then have the incentives to further encourage it. In those countries that are ahead, it's a combination of those elements.
