India’s record rise in patent filings is shifting the focus of its intellectual property (IP) regime towards commercialising innovation, with the Danish Embassy identifying the conversion of IP into commercially viable products and businesses as the next major challenge.
India’s patent filings touched a record of around 1.43 lakh in 2025-26, rising more than 30 per cent over the previous year and making the country the world’s sixth-largest patent filer. India has also moved from 81st to 38th on the Global Innovation Index since 2015.
The Danish assessment said India spends about 0.65 per cent of GDP on research and development (R&D), compared with 3.18 per cent in Denmark, where nearly two-thirds of R&D spending is funded by industry. Strengthening commercialisation and private-sector participation could help convert more Indian innovation into economic value, it said.
“India has built remarkable momentum as an innovation economy. Our shared task is to ensure that more of those ideas become technologies, businesses, jobs and investment. A strong intellectual property system helps turn innovation into economic value,” Denmark’s Ambassador to India Rasmus Abildgaard Christensen said.
The cooperation, under the Green Strategic Partnership launched in 2020, focuses on strengthening IP administration, enforcement, awareness and commercialisation.
The Danish assessment flagged difficulties for MSMEs in navigating IP procedures, limited support for using IP as a business asset and the need for greater enforcement capacity at courts and customs.
Denmark is working with the Ministry of MSME to strengthen Intellectual Property Facilitation Centres (IPFCs) through competency standards and training material. An IP Awareness Manual for MSMEs is also being finalised to help smaller companies use IP to raise capital, license technology, form international partnerships and enter new markets, the Embassy said.
“For an MSME, intellectual property should be a business tool, not an administrative burden. Better awareness and practical support can help smaller companies protect an invention, attract an investor, license technology or enter a new market. That is why strengthening IP capacity for MSMEs is an important part of our cooperation,” Denmark’s IPR Counsellor Louise Boisen said.
The partnership is also seeking to address concerns about predictability in India’s intellectual property regime, particularly for Danish companies operating in IP-intensive sectors where investment decisions on research and development, manufacturing and technology are taken over longer time horizons.
Under a 2020 memorandum between the Department for Promotion of Industry and Internal Trade (DPIIT) and the Danish Patent and Trademark Office (DKPTO), the two sides are cooperating on training, awareness and the exchange of expertise. The two offices are also working to establish quality management systems within the Indian IP Office, while Denmark has supported enforcement training for customs authorities and IP and commercial law training for judges in the Delhi and Madhya Pradesh High Courts.
The cooperation has also identified Section 3(d) of the Patents Act as an area where greater clarity could help investment decisions. The provision requires enhanced efficacy to be demonstrated for patents covering improvements to known medicines. While recognising its public-health objective, the Danish document says how the provision is applied is relevant to investor perceptions and to decisions on launching products and investing in India.
This issue could become increasingly relevant as Indian pharmaceutical and biotechnology companies move towards original research, improved formulations, drug-delivery methods and combinations.
The document says clearer and consistently applied guidance on the provision could provide greater certainty for both domestic innovators and international investors while retaining its public-health objectives.
The next phase of the India-Denmark IPR cooperation will focus on commercialisation, including IP valuation, strategic use of IP and attracting investors. A commercialisation conference with DPIIT and the launch of an IP Awareness Manual for MSMEs are tentatively scheduled for the first week of November 2026.
An all-India judges’ colloquium on intellectual property and commercial laws is planned for January 2027.
