A short explanation of the role of intellectual capital centres for SME.

1. Long term sustainable value growth in
businesses and society:
The role of IC Centres for SME
By Dr Gordon McConnachie, Founding Chairman of Scottish Intellectual Assets Centre and
Chief Technology Officer of Asia Pacific Intellectual Capital Centre
The opportunity for business and for time, resources and expertise.
society to prosper is best captured
through long term sustainable value In the past few years progressive
growth. This premise is borne out countries and regions have
when one looks at premier addressed this opportunity by
companies like General Electric or creating “IC Centres”. These centres
advanced economies like Finland or may have different names (e.g.
Singapore. Future Centre, Academy, etc.) and
may address differing agendas and
Long term sustainable value growth have differing scorecards but they
comes from applying a holistic have a commonality in that they all
approach to the creation of value address the efficiency and
streams from both the tangible and effectiveness with which the balance
the intangible assets within an of tangible and intangible assets can
organisation or within society. This be used to create, extract and release
approach is in fact Intellectual long term, sustainable value. APICC
Capital Management. is such an IC Centre and in this sense
we follow in the footsteps of the
The more progressive large pioneers in Japan, Scotland and
companies have developed aspects Singapore.
of such an approach over the past 20
years and have learnt much from one The Japanese Intellectual Asset
another which is now available to all: Based Management concept grew
the books authored by Patrick out of many years of study of the
Sullivan on the ICM Gathering are a interplay of intangible and tangible
good case study. assets in creating value and is
designed principally to help SME.
While large companies have the The Scottish IA Centre was created
foresight and resources to develop in 2003 to help Scottish companies
such approaches, this is often become aware of and leverage their
impossible for the SME due to lack of structural capital. The Singapore IP
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Asia Pacific Intellectual Capital Centre White Paper #4 (January 2009)
© Asia Pacific Intellectual Capital Centre 2009 All Rights Reserved

2. Academy was created to educate all term sustainable value in line with
Singapore organizations about all their business plans.
aspects of intellectual property.
Similar initiatives backed by local or The International Association of IC
national government are in place Practitioners is currently being
today in The ASEAN Countries, The created in order to allow these IC
Arab Countries, China, Finland, Centres and others as they identify
Indonesia, Sweden, Syria, Taiwan themselves to communicate and
and The Netherlands. learn from one another.
As growth in the modern economy is Hong Kong SAR is in a unique
driven in part by the astute use of position to take advantage of the
knowledge and networks, these opportunities presented by the
centres fill a gap created by the modern mixed economy. A highly
explosive growth of the knowledge developed region of China, Hong
based component of our mixed Kong SAR is not only a developed
economy (Agrarian, Industrial and service economy but also a bridge
Knowledge Based). The centres between Mainland China and the
facilitate the mental move from the Western World. The APICC, in its
industrial age way of thinking (asset role of IC Centre in Hong Kong SAR,
based) to the more fluid concepts provides one of the tools which will
required in the modern mixed enable Hong Kong SAR to reach its
economy (value stream based). They true potential. APICC policy is to
provide counseling and tools for work inclusively with all entities in
awareness raising, self-diagnosis and Hong Kong SAR to achieve this aim.
action including measures which can
be used in management to track Websites:
progress. Japan IAbM
http://www.meti.go.jp/policy/intellectual_as
Key deliverables for these IC Centres sets/english.html
include a) being a centre of Scotland Intllectual Assets Centre
excellence and best practice in ICM, www.ia-centre.org.uk
the management of tangible and Singapore IP Academy
intangible assets to create long term, http://www.ipacademy.com.sg
sustainable value growth, b)
providing education, diagnosis, Reference:
coaching and first level consulting Gordon McConnachie, “How Countries and
and c) providing guidance to allow Regions are Helping their Companies Create
companies and organizations to Value from Intellectual Capital”, “Einstein
work out the best route in their in the Boardroom”, Wiley, NY, 2006, pp.
particular situation to achieve long 131 – 151.
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Asia Pacific Intellectual Capital Centre White Paper #4 (January 2009)
© Asia Pacific Intellectual Capital Centre 2009 All Rights Reserved