PIPRA
Developing countries need better technology. In the next decades, advances in technology will drive poverty alleviation as we continue to address major challenges in health, agriculture, water, and energy.
But getting good technology to serve the needs of the poor is notoriously difficult. From design to delivery, complex decisions affect whether the technology will be useful and adopted by target households, whether sustainability can be achieved, and ultimately whether the technology can have the greatest possible impact on poverty. Through education, public information, and offering a range of support services, PIPRA improves the ability of organizations around the world as they work in research, development, and delivery of technologies for the poor.
PIPRA provides services to foundations, not-for-profit organizations, universities, international aid agencies, and governments – each with different needs, but all working toward the common goal of using technology to address global poverty.
PIPRA provides services in the following areas:
Intellectual property right (IPR) decisions upstream can play a key role in ensuring widespread access to innovations. In gaining access to technologies from both public and private sectors, IPR can be an important consideration. Organizations working to get better technology to the poor must also assess how to use IP strategically to reach downstream goals of development, manufacturing, and delivery. Sometimes the optimal choice is broad and free dissemination, but other times real impact on poverty requires using IP rights as incentives to engage other organizations’ resources and capital.
PIPRA can:
While there is widespread digital access to technology solutions through patent databases and other sources, legal, business, and technical skills are often needed to navigate the sea of information in a practical way. PIPRA offers services to organizations that integrate in-depth knowledge of the science with commercialization and legal analysis to understand the applicability and availability of technologies.
PIPRA can: - Analyze patent, literature, and other data sources to identify appropriate technologies. - Assess the risks and benefits of accessing technologies from various organizations. - Advise on potential substitute technologies that may be in the public domain and more easily accessible. - Work with practitioners to determine the availability of know-how, skills, and capital that may be necessary - complements to the technology itself in order to ensure its optimal use. - Provide information on IPR, regulatory, and commercial considerations to augment an organization’s technical decision-making capacity.
RD&D of technologies for the poor almost invariably requires cooperative solutions that transcend international boundaries, public and private sectors, and diverse cultures. Thoughtful agreements can make a strong foundation for a partnership, guarantee access to technologies on practical terms, and create future opportunities for getting better technology to the poor. Public sector organizations need high quality agreements that serve their goals as well as match their institutional mandates, but it often doesn’t make financial sense to have the capacity in-house to negotiate and draft agreements. PIPRA works with a worldwide network of attorneys on a pro-bono and reduced-fee basis to apply high quality expertise with experience in the types of contractual issues faced when developing and delivery technologies for the poor.
PIPRA can:
A truly promising pro-poor technological solution has to meet multi-faceted demands. In addition to its technical merits, the technology must address complex adoption and use criteria for the chosen market, demonstrate a potential for sufficient socio-economic impact on the poor, and be supported by a sustainable business and/or delivery model.
PIPRA works with organizations to develop and implement strategies that consider the entire process from design to delivery. By asking tough questions and critically assessing options through the lens of impacting poverty, PIPRA can improve decision-making in organizations working in any stage of product development and delivery.
PIPRA can:
PIPRA’s research laboratories are based at the University of California, Davis and focus specifically on plant biotechnology, supporting agricultural projects for downstream commercial deployment and humanitarian application. Scientific research and development strategies take into consideration technical, as well as IPR, freedom-to-operate, regulatory, and other issues critical for successful commercialization. PIPRA’s laboratory and IP analysis staff work jointly in identifying and testing plant transformation biotechnologies to develop improved crops.
PIPRA can: