| India's patent laws comparable to developed nations': Boeing |
|
Washington, 15 February Even as a section of the US' corporate sector lobbies against India over protection of intellectual property rights ( IPR), American aircraft giant Boeing on Saturday said the country had a strong legal framework to protect such rights. " In Boeing's experience, India has a legal framework that is adequate to protect IP with no known cases of IP violation involving Boeing's activities in the defense and aerospace sector," the American multinational said in its remarks to US Trade Commission. The commission this week conducted ahearing in connection with its investigation Trade, Investment, and Industrial Policies in India: Effects on the US Economy. The statement from Boeing, which has major investment and research and development centres in India and has received orders worth billions of dollars in the aviation and defence sector, assumes significance in view of the fact that a section of influential American corporate sector has been lobbying at the Capitol Hill and the Obama administration against India's intellectual property regime. " A detailed review of Boeing's enterprise- wide activities in India, including the export of Boeing products, as well as sourcing activities, indicates an adequate IPR legal framework is in place for Boeing's aerospace and defence products in India," the statement said. "Boeing has had a positive experience with Indian customers, partners and suppliers on IPR protection. Boeing continues to monitor efforts by India's Ministry of Defence to indigenise defence production in India to reach strategic selfreliance," the company said in its fourpage submission. According to the statement, Boeing is the largest producer, by dollar value, of US exports to India. "Since late 2005, Boeing has secured contracts from Indian buyers worth tens of billions of US dollars, which is creating and will sustain at least an estimated 180,000 US jobs in a high- skill, high- value industry over the delivery period of these contracts," the company said. "India has emerged as one of the largest export markets for Boeing ( fifth largest for Boeing Commercial Airplanes and second largest for Boeing Defense, by market potential) and is a key market that Boeing will continue to develop in the future," it said. Coming in strong defence of India's IP regime, Boeing said Indian laws applicable to the range of the company's business in India are comparable to regulations in other developed countries, as India is a signatory to all major conventions and treaties on this subject. "Additionally, in our experience, there have not been any major patent violations in India pertaining to Boeing's defence/ aerospace products. Boeing sells its products ( defence & aviation) to the India and private airlines where our IPR is contractually protected; we see minimal risk of product IPR violations by the government and private airlines." the Indian Air Force at the Boeing's plant in Long Beach, California, US PHOTO: BLOOMBERG Country has emerged as one of the largest export markets for the aircraft maker |
| 'Indian Financial Code could be in place by 2014- end' |
|
Iasked myself how would the UTI crisis had been faced if we had all the instruments and all the institutions that have now been recommended by the Financial Sector Legislative Reforms Commission ( FSLRC), the commission to rewrite our financial sector laws. When an institution like UTI gets into distress the first port of call should be the Resolution Corporation. It is largely recommended that we must put in place a Resolution Corporation that will identify financial firms that are in trouble but not yet bankrupt and will force them out of business through sale or liquidation. When there is a systemic crisis involving an organisation like UTI, the first responder must be a place where all regulators can gather and function like a virtual war room. If I had gone through the recommendations of FSLRC as Indian Financial Code that they have recommended, the war room in such a crisis would be the Technical Secretariat of the Financial Stability and Development Council, which will have a sound information base in the form of Financial Data Management Centre. In the absence of Financial Data Management Centre and absence of Financial Stability and Development Council, the war room, I am afraid, usually turns out to be the office of the finance minister. But all this will have meaning only when we acknowledge the need for micro- prudential regulation. While our regulation is focussed on macro- prudential regulation – we are good regulators of the macro economy – we do not have micro- prudential regulations. It is worth remembering that neither the old UTI Act nor the Sebi Act has defined micro- prudential regulation. Micro- prudential regulations are about verifying promises made to consumers by players in the capital market. If the mutual fund says that the unit is worth ₹ 8, we need someone to verify that the underlying portfolio is worth ₹ 8. If a mutual fund promises assured returns of 10 per cent, we need someone to verify that there is a locked- in position on the market that you will deliver 10 per cent returns. These are the things that flow from micro- prudential regulation that were not understood in 1964 when UTI was created, and I am afraid, we are only now beginning to understand the need for micro- prudential regulation. I say this because I think we cannot lose time in implementing the recommendations of the FSLRC. We have divided the recommendations into legislative actions and non- legislative actions. And I am deemed to report that FSLRC, when I addressed my first seminar, I said I realise that it's not possible to initiate and complete legislative actions as required within the term of this Cabinet. But we will begin work and then we hope that legislative actions can be completed in 2014. But we can take all the steps that have been recommended under the non- legislative actions and I am happy to inform you that a lot of measures on non- legislative actions have been initiated in the ministry of finance, and I hope that they will be unveiled and rolled out in the weeks and months ahead. But it is my sincere appeal to all the political parties, to all the members of Parliament, now and those who will be elected to the next Parliament, that we must complete legislative actions based on FSLRC recommendations in 2014. And we must have the major part of the Indian Financial Code in place in 2014. On behalf of my party, I can assure the financial community that if we find a place in the government, we will complete major legislative actions to put in place an Indian Financial Code by the end of 2014. Iam happy that UTI, despite the fact that it has slipped from the top rank to a few notches below, continues to enjoy the confidence of a large number of investors. Assets under management of UTI are little over ₹ 75,000 crore, about nine per cent of the total assets under management of the mutual fund industry. UTI AMC has also created a niche for itself in the alternate asset management space with companies such as UTI Capital Ltd and UTI Ventures Ltd. Recently, Sebi has made a number of changes to promote the mutual fund industry. I know there is a debate and I am engaged in discussions with the Sebi chairman. Some players in the market have attributed the stress faced by the mutual fund industry, to the ban on the entry load that was imposed by Sebi. Following the ban, there was a sharp decline in the gross mobilisation of funds. It dropped by nearly 22 per cent from 88.59 lakh- crore in 2010- 11 to 68.19 lakh- crore in 2011- 12. After a series of consultations and deliberations, Sebi took certain steps to re- energise the mutual fund industry. Among the steps were — increase in penetration of mutual fund products and energising the distribution network by increasing the limits of expenses that is charged by AMCs to the fund, improving the reach of mutual fund products in smaller cities and towns beyond the top 15 cities, alignment of interest of investors, distributors and AMCs and investor protection by addressing issues of mis- selling and churning. I am happy to note that these actions have had a positive impact on the mutual fund industry. I am told that 946 new branches have been opened in cities beyond the top 15 cities upto December 2013. And the Assets under Management from such cities has increased to around nearly 12 per cent at the end of December 2013. Edited excerpts from Finance Minister P Chidambaram's speech at UTI's Golden Jubilee Celebrations on February 2, 2014, in Mumbai OPINION PCHIDAMBARAM |
--
This mail and its attachments (if any) are confidential information intended for persons to whom the email is planned for delivery by the sender. If you have received this mail in error please notify the sender of the error by forwarding the email and its attachments (if any) and then deleting the mail received in error and the relevant email trail in this connection without making any copies or taking any prints.
__._,_.___
No comments:
Post a Comment