New Delhi: Tata Steel has received the Thomson Reuters Innovation Award in the ‘hi-tech corporate’ category. The award was presented to the company by Dr Ashwani Kumar, minister of state for science and technology, earth sciences and planning, Government of India. It was received on behalf of the company by BK Bhuyan, senior manager, patent, Tata Steel, at a function held in New Delhi on November 17, 2011.

Since 2007, Thomson Reuters has been presenting the Thomson Reuters Innovation Awards to recognise innovation and entrepreneurship in India. The award recognises the most innovative academic institutions and commercial enterprises headquartered in India for their spirit of innovation in R&D as it relates to all aspects of patent publications in India.

It merits mention that a key indicator of innovation is patenting activity. The importance of intellectual property as a major source of economic and technological development in India is demonstrated by the increasing creativity and impact of Indian research and technology throughout the world as measured by patenting activity. There has been a substantial increase in Indian patent applications in the last five years — from 24,505 applications in 2006 to 34,000 in 2010 — thereby recording a compounded annual growth rate of 8.8 per cent.

This year, four awards were presented across different sectors — pharma corporate, pharma academic, hi-tech corporate and hi-tech academic. Tata Steel bagged the award in the hi-tech corporate category.