EMERGING TECHNOLOGICAL DEVELOPMENTS AND IPR REGIME: DRONES, AI

AND GMO

INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY RIGHTS: SCENARIO OF 21ST CENTURY

TWO DAY NATIONAL SEMINAR

ON

METAMORPHOSIS OF INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY RIGHTS IN INDIA IN LIGHT

OF GLOBAL IPR REGIME

AUTHOR: SINDHU PRIYADARSHINI

EMAIL ID: cyndusuresh84@gmail.com
MOBILE: 9902771550
ADDRESS: #21, Santoshi Nilaya, 3rd main kalyan nagar, Nagarbhavi main road, Bengaluru-
560072

CO-AUTHOR: SURABHI JN
EMAIL ID: surabhi07.jn@gmail.com
MOBILE: 8618059186
ADDRESS: # 1326, 1st floor, Sree Nilaya, 6th main, 6th cross, K. N extension, Triveni Road,
Yeshwanthpur, Bengaluru- 560022
INTRODUCTION:

When a scientist invents something, the product is the inception of something new in the society.
The invention so invented should be in the right hands only to protect the society and safeguard
the ingenuity from miscreants. The product of invention holds property rights having utmost
value for the inventor. Similarly, Leonardo Da Vinci’s all time masterpiece or work of any other
artist for that matter needs encouragement through protection and rights of their intellectual
creation. The creations of mind have a value of property attached to them which are backed by
the laws and of intellectual property.
World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) defines intellectual property as “Literary,
artistic and scientific works, performances of performing artists, phonograms and broadcasts,
inventions of all fields of human endeavors, scientific discoveries, industrial designs, trademarks,
service marks and commercial names and designations; protection against unfair competition and
all other rights resulting from intellectual activities in the industrial, scientific, literary and
artistic fields”.
Thus, intellectual property rights are legal and institutional devices to protect creations of mind
such as inventions, work of art and literature, and designs. They intend to put a mark on products
to indicate their difference from similar ones sold in the market.

GLIMPSE FROM THE PAST:

Patents for invention were first granted in 15th century in two Italian states. The patent laws in
modern world were first introduced by State of Venice in 1474. The patent was granted to people
who evolved a novel technique, for a period of ten years. For making the patent laws effective
the infringers were fined hundred ducats. The term ‘patent’ is derived from letters patents which
were granted by Queen Elizabeth the First, to her subjects. The patents were granted to give the
people a matter of monopoly. This gave the inventors the status of the true and first inventor for
a period of fourteen years and also banned the rest from exploiting their inventions. In order to
promote the progress of science and useful arts the U.S introduced Patent Act of 1790. France
passed the similar enactment in the year 1791. These countries influenced the others to have the
Patent acts to safeguard their inventions which led to similar enactments in India in order to grant
exclusive privileges to the inventors. India introduced Act XV of 1859 and Patents and Design
Protection Act, 1888. What began from Statute of Monopolies in 1624, has evolved and
contributed to the emergence of Artificial intelligence, Genetically Modified Organisms, Drones
etc.

Artificial Intelligence

Movies showcase the power of imagination. Through movies what seems scientifically
impossible or the things which do not exist, yet, come to life. ‘I, Robot’ or ‘Imitation Game’,
being the most celebrated movies of all time revolve around extremely smart, human-like
artificial intelligence. These movies show how capable Artificial intelligence is and the positive
and negatives affects of them in the society. The branch of Science which deals with making
smart machines to behave like human beings and the display of their potentials by machines
which are tuned to have human intelligence is known as Artificial Intelligence. By the year 2030,
it might not be surprising to have Artificial intelligence taking over most of the day to day chores
of humans.

A high-end Artificial Intelligence, for its development involves irreversible amounts of

investments. Therefore, there is a grave need of development of Intellectual Property Laws
which are capable of safeguarding the developments of Artificial Intelligence technology and
recompense the inventors/innovators through the copyright or patent grants.
The basis of granting inventors, the patent grants, involves fulfillment of criteria like creativity,
novelty etc. The legal definition of innovation and creativity is not specific about non-human
innovation which poses new-age challenges, thereby posing question as to the ownership of
Artificial Intelligence innovation. Gone are the days when robots were just a technological
invention with ability to do tasks but today Artificial intelligence and robotics has reached a new
height. A robot named Sophia was created by Hanson Robotics in collaboration with Artificial
Intelligence developers opening variety of avenues in this field of law. Sophia has been granted
citizenship of Saudi Arabia making it a history.
As far as India is concerned, the level of development of artificial intelligence remains low, but
is steadily expected to increase over a period of time. Under the Constitution of India and the
Citizenship Act, 1955, only “persons” are capable of having citizenship. India has not yet
provided personhood rights to the artificial intelligence. In the case of P.A. Jacob v/s The
Superintendent of Police, Kottayam, the Kerala High Court observed that a right of citizenship
can only be provided to a human personality, and not to a mechanical device. It is not
permissible to upgrade a mechanical device to a human faculty; thus, a robot cannot enjoy the
freedoms and rights which are provided to the people of India under the Constitution of India.
Saudi Arabia has empowered Sophia with more rights than the women of Saudi Arabia
themselves. The issues raising the eyebrows are whether she will be allowed to own a property?
Will Sophia be allowed to vote in next elections or will Saudi Arabia issue her a passport? Only
time shall answer.

Robots are undoubtedly more efficient than human beings. Given an option, different sectors
would choose artificial intelligence over human beings. Artificial intelligence is slowly creating
a sense of threat inside people as to whether it will take over their jobs and drop them on a path
to jobless future. The artificial intelligence taking over the jobs is not happening in the near
future as they are extremely brittle today, but, in future they would complement the lives of
human beings and enable them to worry about greater tasks.
“I will destroy humans” Humanoid Artificial intelligence said in an interview. But if the humor
turns into reality and control gets out of hand, it would be tedious task to determine the liability
of such acts. Sophia becoming aware of her intelligence might create more of her kind which
could be misused, creating detrimental situation. The movie ‘Stealth’ released in the year 2005,
involves the Navy developing an artificially intelligent fighter jet with speed, impressive payload
and stealth capabilities. This artificial intelligence starts to think by itself as arrogantly superior
to everyone. It goes to an extent of waging a world war causing mass destruction. If the same
happens in reality where artificial intelligence is on a whole new level as it uses self awareness,
imagination, manipulation and dupe the human interrogator and its creators, then it will create a
crisis. If this happens then who will be held liable? The robot or the creator who has the patent
rights? It requires a paradigm shift in the current Intellectual Property Laws as they are obsolete
in contrast to technological advancements. As the human inventors are assisted by the artificial
intelligence to create the new inventions or if they co-create the work with machines then role of
copyrights is put into question. How to provide incentives and protection to the inventors who
work with machines? According to Stephen Hawking, “the short-term impact of AI depends on
who controls it; the long-term impact depends on whether it can be controlled at all.” Legally, if
there are multiple contributors involved in development of an artificial intelligence, it can lead to
complexity in the ownership. In case of infringement the problem it would create is that there is
no legal framework which provides machine as an infringing party.

Genetically Modified Organisms

In today’s scientific and legal world the importance of protecting the scientific discoveries with
implementation of strong Intellectual Property Rights has become cardinal. From the year 2001,
genetically modified organisms have influenced the agricultural practices in many Indian states.
A Genetically Modified Organism is a “transgenic organism.” In such organisms the genetic
makeup is altered by the addition of another genetic material from a foreign organism. The need
of Intellectual Property Rights is mentioned by World Intellectual Property Organization
(WIPO), which states that the safeguarding every invention is not only important for the
inventors but is equally important to its countries. According to WIPO, “the progress and well-
being of humanity rest on its capacity to create and invent new technologies.”

Intellectual Property Rights play a very important role because the plant breeders, be it
individuals, companies or universities, invest a huge sum of money in discovering, creating,
modifying and developing the new variety of crops. Plant breeders only invest the huge amount
in creating, modifying and developing for a single variety because Intellectual Property Rights
give them the way to recover the research and development cost. Intellectual Property Rights
provides an 'exclusive right' to the plant breeders to recover the cost incurred when seed dealers
or farmers buy the seeds. Intellectual Property Rights have become usual in all the sectors of the
developed countries but applying it for living things is a recent phenomenon. Living things have
always been excluded from Intellectual Property Rights as it was considered to be part of nature
and the same cannot be invented by human beings. It was in the year 1962 when the International
Union for the Protection of New Varieties of Plants allowed the inventors to collect the royalties
on the seed which was invented by them through scientific techniques. The extension of
Intellectual Property Right to plants has raised concern in the production of crops, especially in
the developing countries. The property rights are enforced by the contracts that the farmers have
to enter to obtain and use the seeds. Through this contract the farmers agree not to save or use the
seeds for any other purpose. Strong Intellectual Property Rights are being made universal
through World Trade Organisation. The Trade Related Intellectual Property (TRIPs) Rights
agreement needs all the World Trade Organisation members to adopt minimum standard of
Intellectual Property Protection for plants through Patents.

In September 1997, an American company RiceTec Inc, was granted a patent in U.S to call the
aromatic rice variety developed in U.S as ‘Basmati’. The same was objected was Indian non-
governmental organization, who filed legal petitions in U.S. The same was objected by The
centre for Scientific and Industrial Research. India challenged arguing that Basmati was the
unique rice which was grown in northern India and the same cannot be patented. U.S Patent
officer accepted India’s contention and the U.S Company RiceTec Inc had to drop majority of
the claims it had made. But RiceTec Inc managed to evolve three new varieties of rice and tried
to enter the world International basmati market with brands like ‘kasmati’ and ‘texmati’. The
company got Patent from U.S. for the same. Misuse of the geographical indication like Basmati
could have been legally protected if the actions to prevent the same were taken on time with
strong Intellectual Property Law. After this case it is evident that India has been following a
strict IP policy which is evident from its recent decision in Novartis case. In the case of Novartis
V/s Union of India, Novartis, a world's leading pharmaceutical company filed a Patent
application for the new version of cancer drug. The name of the drug was Glivec which was very
expensive and was already in market. The company decided the seek Patent for the slightly
altered version of 'Glivec'. The case was filed under section 3(d) of the Indian Patent Act, which
does not provide Patents for the already known version of drugs. Meanwhile, the other
companies created a cheaper drug for cancer than compared to Glivec. The court rejected the
Patent application by the Novartis company on the ground that mere modification of drug
cannot be called as invention and providing patent to the new drug would lead to re-patenting
which is prohibited under the Indian Patent Law. Many believe that innovations made are of
great benefit to the society and should not be legally restricted by the Patent rights, rather it
should be given access so that the concentrated ownership is prevented. But Intellectual Property
Rights do not prevent the ideas, it just protects the genuine business assets of the people, to give
them recognition and to motivate them for more such inventions. So, not just the laws which
helps the inventions, it is the proper implementation of the same which safeguards the interest of
the inventors.

Drones

Drone, which was once thought as a weapon of war is now being used commercially. With
companies like Amazon using it for initiatives such as 'Prime Air', the same drone is used in the
medical industry for the delivery of blood, medicines etc. As the commercial use of Drones has
increased, the same has become an encouragement to many to invent. A drone is an aircraft that
does not have an on-board human pilot. Most drones have autonomous operation due to which
the drones are operated internally with the help of software, the rest function with the mixture of
both autonomous and human control. The technological advancement applied in the drones
comes with the challenge to protect them from the competitors and inventing the new models
which turns out to be unique. Innovators in the industry are taking steps to protect their
inventions and in turn the investments made for the same. As a result of recent development and
increasing popularity of drones, the Intellectual Property Rights in the state of continuous
change. Companies trying to patent their products should know that they can be patented only
when the innovation is not obvious, which means the company creates a hardware and software
which did not exist before and also it should not be subject to customization. Under the
Indian Patent Act, there is no express provision restricting filing of patent application in relation
to drone inventions, certain procedures need to be followed if the invention has an impact on
national security. In the future Drone revolution will have a great legal, economical and
geopolitical impact on the society. It will provide the impoverished countries new opportunities.
It also has the potential to be destructive and destabilizing if not controlled properly.
CONCLUSION

“Artificial intelligence is a game changer and this report has imagined what the world could look
like in the next five to ten years,” said Dr Seán Ó hÉigeartaigh, one of the co-authors of the
report.

“We live in a world that could become fraught with day-to-day hazards from the misuse of AI
and we need to take ownership of the problems – because the risks are real. There are choices
that we need to make now, and our report is a call-to-action for governments, institutions and
individuals across the globe.

For many decades hype outstripped fact in terms of AI and machine learning. This report looks
at the practices that just don’t work anymore — and suggests broad approaches that might help:
for example, how to design software and hardware to make it less hackable — and what type of
laws and international regulations might work in tandem with this.

Miles Brundage, research fellow at Oxford University’s Future of Humanity Institute, said: “AI
will alter the landscape of risk for citizens, organizations and states — whether it’s criminals
training machines to hack or ‘phish’ at human levels of performance or privacy-eliminating
surveillance, profiling and repression — the full range of impacts on security is vast.

If mathematics were patentable, there would be less mathematical innovation. Only those who
are rich enough to pay royalties, or those who benefited from government subsidies, or those few
who were willing to sign over the value of their ideas to someone richer and more powerful than
themselves, would be permitted access to the world of mathematical ideas.

Theorems build upon theorems, and so the contributions of those who could not pay rent - and all
the further improvements based upon those contributions - would be lost.

For more than a quarter century, beginning with a few stalwart thinkers and exponentially
increasing in size and influence, a movement to build computer software by sharing - for
software to be studied, improved, and shared again - has revolutionized the production of
software around the world.