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Ten Years of the European Inventor Award: a Retrospective Look at the Inventors and Ideas

22-Jan-2015 | Source : | Visits : 7618
Special to ag-IP-news Agency
 
MUNICH - Some things are common to all pioneering innovations, whether it's a revolutionary wall plug, complex standards such as MP3 or LTE, ground-breaking drugs that offer a ray hope in the fight against HIV and cancer, or DNA fingerprinting. They make our existence easier, save lives or constitute a quantum leap in research. They create value and jobs. It is a matter of fact that many landmark inventions are “made in Europe”. Every year, Europe is the source of some 94 000 patent applications filed with the European Patent Office (EPO). And a strong European patent system provides a good regulatory environment for creative minds – and for the protection of technical innovation in nearly all walks of life. 
 
Since 2006, the EPO's European Inventor Award has recognised inventors who have made a special contribution to social, technological and economic progress. On 11 June 2015, before a gathering of inventors, entrepreneurs, politicians and scientific leaders in Paris, this coveted prize will be awarded for the tenth time. 
 
"Over the last decade, many inventions have changed our lives and entire industries have sprung up, and the role of European inventors has been pivotal in all this. The European Inventor Award highlights the contribution made by Europe’s inventors, researchers and entrepreneurs to innovation, and the ways in which their outstanding achievements have spurred economic development and created jobs in Europe," says EPO President Benoît Battistelli.
 
The European Inventor Award
 
To celebrate the European Inventor Award's tenth year, the EPO is presenting a technological retrospective of the time since the award’s inception, illustrated by reference to finalists and winners. Which inventors have been nominated and where are they from? What was the impetus for their invention, and what is its impact on society today? The answers to these and other questions will be provided, along with revealing background information, in specially produced videos available on the EPO website. Each week, a different theme will take centre stage.
 
The series kicks off today with a spotlight on Italian inventor and entrepreneur Catia Bastioli and green technology. In 2007, Bastioli was the first woman to win the European Inventor Award, for her biodegradable plastics. British geneticist Alec Jeffreys and themes relating to security will be the focus of the second retrospective. Jeffreys was only 27 years old when he developed DNA fingerprinting, nowadays used all over the world. 
 
The weekly retrospectives will continue until Easter, and will be devoted to fascinating topics like driver assistance systems and scientific milestones surrounding World Cancer Day on 4 February and International Women's Day on 8 March. 
 
For more information and videos, visit us at www.epo.org/european-inventor or on our Facebook page at https://www.facebook.com/europeanpatentoffice.
 
With more than 7 000 staff, the European Patent Office (EPO) is one of the largest public service institutions in Europe. Its headquarters are in Munich and it also has offices in Berlin, Brussels, The Hague and Vienna. The EPO was founded with the aim of strengthening co-operation on patents in Europe. Through the EPO's centralised patent granting procedure, inventors are able to obtain high-quality patent protection in the 38 member states of the European Patent Organisation. The EPO is also the world's leading authority in patent information and patent searching. 
 
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