Outsourced R&D highlights need for IP rules

K.C. Krishnadas, EE Times
(07/11/2006 9:39 AM EDT)

BANGALORE, India — Intellectual property controls remain inadeqate even as more companies outsource electronics R&D. A new report warns that the situation has been further complicated by the fact that partners can eventually become rivals when research moves to manufacturing.

Multinational firms are setting up global R & D networks across time zones to be closer to manufacturing and to permit round-the-clock R&D. Siemens, for example, has located only 51 percent of its 45,000 researchers in Germany. The rest are spread across the globe, a Frost & Sullivan study said.

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