India’s knowledge services to the world is broader than you think.  Most imagine it to be just software centred. Of late we have begun to hear of bio research. Now there is more.

A little known --albeit small-- beginning is in the area of intellectual property rights. Philips of Netherlands owes almost 10% of its $3 billion dollar revenue to the patents it holds. Philips has 4000 researchers and owns 75,000 patents. But securing patents based on its employees’ work is an expensive proposition. Originality and commercial value have to be assessed right—very early.

Understandably, the patent management has always been at Netherlands. But now for the first time Philips will depend on an overseas centre—in Bangalore. A small team of 6 highly qualified Indians will scan the research work in Philips labs and identify the promising ones for development.

The Bangalore team has been entrusted with judging frontier research work. Obviously the work has not come to India because of cheap labour but because premium minds are available at a very affordable price.

The Bangalore centre is manned by M Techs and PhDs. And India produces enough of them to fuel future growth of similar ventures.