27 August, 2019
Three innovative Singapore companies clinched top awards at the prestigious WIPO-IPOS Intellectual Property Awards 2019. The results, unveiled at the opening ceremony of IP Week @ SG 2019, saw winners who have clearly integrated intellectual property (IP) strategies into their business models and achieved outstanding growth as a result.
This year’s winners1 are:
- WIPO Users’ Trophy – Razer (Asia-Pacific) Pte Ltd
- WIPO IP Enterprise Trophy – Razer (Asia-Pacific) Pte Ltd
- IPOS Award for IP Champions
- Biolidics Ltd
- Durapower Holdings Pte Ltd
- Razer (Asia-Pacific) Pte Ltd
Organised by the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) and the Intellectual Property Office of Singapore (IPOS), the annual awards celebrate the achievements of innovative enterprises that demonstrate strategic management and commercialisation of IP and intangible assets (IA) that they create and own.
The organisers highlighted that the calibre of the 27 local and international enterprise submissions this year were outstanding. The winners stood out as they had a clear IP commercialisation strategy, approaching IP as a critical input and deftly combining various types of IP to create a competitive advantage. The award recognises their efforts and aims to further encourage other enterprises to learn from them and adopt a strategic approach towards managing their IP and IA in today’s innovation-driven economy.
As part of the judging criteria, participants were also required to articulate the social impact of their business. The winners respectively contributed to areas of renewable energy storage systems, advancing technologies in cancer diagnosis, supporting start-ups through incubators and creating gaming products and services for the disabled community.
Since its inception in 2013, a total of 21 enterprises and organisations have received the awards.
They include well-known brands such as Benjamin Barker, Creative Technology, Fraser and Neave, Heptagon Micro Optics, MediaTek Singapore, MindChamps Holdings, Siemens Medical Instruments, SK Jewellery, and Unisantis Electronics Singapore, among others. The diversity of the award winners over the years reflects how IP and IA exist across sectors and industries, and can be successfully managed for international growth and expansion.
Ms Trina Ha, Director, IP Strategy Solutions, IPOS International, said, “Our WIPO-IPOS IP Award winners are leading lights of how innovation and IP can be integrated fully into the business strategy to drive enterprise growth. We wish them continuing success in their innovation journey and hope this will inspire others to discover how to leverage on their intangible assets as strategic drivers for growth.”
Mr Choo Wei-Pin, Chief Legal Officer, Razer Inc., said, “Razer is the leading global lifestyle brand for gamers with over 70 million users on our hardware, software and services platforms. From pioneering gaming hardware categories like gaming laptops to building Razer Gold, the world’s most popular virtual credit system for gamers, these achievements were made possible through the robust IP framework of Singapore and other nations. We are honoured to receive three major awards today.
They are a resounding testimony to our relentless drive to innovate.” Mr Ivan Lew, CEO and Executive Director, Biolidics Limited, said, “We are honoured to be recognised for our R&D and commercialisation efforts related to cancer diagnostic solutions. While we have a limited number of IPs, our approach in maximising the potential and expansion of our IP portfolio has
been transformative to our business strategy, which has led to new partnerships, new revenue models and accessibility to new markets. More importantly, our efforts are centred on our core mission to create more meaningful impact on cancer patients and stakeholders.”
Mr Kelvin Lim, Group CEO, Durapower Holdings said, “The adoption of an innovation culture and the embracement of science and technology have allowed Durapower to be differentiated in today’s vast lithium battery market. We believe that the continued effort to create and manage cutting-edge IP as part of our global growth strategy will allow our standing in the international market to be further strengthened. Winning this prestigious award is a massive endorsement of our philosophy and beliefs.”
From left to right:
Chief Executive of IPOS, Daren Tang, Senior R&D Engineer of Durapower Holdings, Dr Shen Nan, Assistant Director-General of WIPO, Naresh Prasad, Chief Legal Officer of Razer Inc., Choo Wei-Pin, Singapore Minister for Trade and Industry, Mr Chan Chun Sing, Senior Patent Attorney of Razer Inc., Nina Duan, Director of Legal of Razer Inc., Elaine Lim, CEO and Executive Director of Biolidics Limited, Ivan Lew, Chairman of IPOS, Dr Stanley Lai.
1 Refer to Annexes for further details
