Singapore: Singapore ranks as fifth most innovative country in the world

Managing IP is part of Legal Benchmarking Limited, 1-2 Paris Gardens, London, SE1 8ND

Copyright © Legal Benchmarking Limited and its affiliated companies 2025

Accessibility | Terms of Use | Privacy Policy | Modern Slavery Statement

Singapore: Singapore ranks as fifth most innovative country in the world

The Global Innovation Index 2018 report released in July 2018 ranked Singapore fifth among 126 innovative nations around the world. Singapore retained its first place ranking in Asia for the fifth year running and is only found to be less innovative than Switzerland, the Netherlands, Sweden and the UK. Singapore's strong performance in the Global Innovation Index is attributed to the various government initiatives and programmes launched to spur and protect innovation in the city-state.

One such initiative is the FinTech Fast Track brought in by the Intellectual Property Office of Singapore (IPOS) in April 2018. The FinTech Fast Track reduces prosecution for FinTech-related patent applications from two years to approximately six months. Under this accelerated prosecution, applicants are able to commercialise their FinTech innovations more rapidly, helping Singapore grow faster in infocomm technologies and providing better protection to Singapore's financial sector.

Apart from expedited patent prosecution, IPOS provides increased support for Sino-Singapore collaborations by broadening its services to industries in the Sino-Singapore Guangzhou Knowledge City. In cooperation with Southern China, Singapore established the Sino-Singapore Guangzhou Knowledge City to focus on high-tech innovation developments. As IP plays an important role in helping enterprises protect and market their innovations, IPOS has also set up its first overseas IP representative office in the Knowledge City in Guangzhou. It is expected that this new office will support high-tech enterprises in expanding their business to the South East Asian region and provide innovative entities in Singapore with opportunities for quicker and increased access to the Chinese market.

Singapore has also increased protection mechanisms to help spur innovation development. The Intellectual Property (Border Enforcement) Bill was recently passed by the Singapore Parliament for the purpose of bringing Singapore's law in line with the European Union-Singapore Free Trade Agreement. The Bill enhances border enforcement against goods infringing intellectual property rights. Specifically, Singapore Customs is given more power to seize infringing goods exported from or imported into Singapore.

jiao-yang.jpg

Jiao Yang


Spruson & Ferguson

Singapore

more from across site and SHARED ros bottom lb

More from across our site

A settlement between Philips and Transsion and a loss for AstraZeneca in the UK were also among the top talking points
Working with Harvey and Microsoft, the firm has been at the forefront of developing AI tools for its lawyers, and is now exploring new projects and business models
The Emotional Perception AI case, which centres on the patentability of an artificial neural network, will be heard next week
Developments included a court order related to InterDigital’s anti-anti-suit injunction against Disney, and clarification on recoverable costs
Partners at Foley Hoag examine how recent CJEU jurisprudence may serve as a catalyst for recalibrating US judicial reluctance to entertain foreign patent claims
International law firms have high hopes for their IP practices in Saudi Arabia, with many opening offices, but recruiting and retaining talent in the Kingdom presents unique challenges
Patrick Ogola joins us for our ‘Five minutes with’ series to discuss helping African entrepreneurs on the global stage, and explains why young lawyers should speak up
Heli Pihlajamaa, the EPO’s principal director for patent law and procedures, joins us to take stock of the unitary patent following its second anniversary
Kelly Thompson, chair of South African firm Adams & Adams, discusses self-belief, self-doubt, and the importance of saying yes
The renowned food brands were represented by a host of lawyers, including members of the firms’ IP teams
Gift this article