Federal Intellectual Property Management Survey (FIPM)

Detailed information for 2008/2009

This survey collects data describing how federal science base departments manage, protect and commercialise their intellectual property and the resources that are used to do it. The data collected are used by federal science policy analysts to monitor federal government effort to commercialise the intellectual property it generates.

Data release - June 29, 2010

• Questionnaire(s) and reporting guide(s)
• Description
• Data sources and methodology

Description

This survey collects data from science base federal departments that manage intellectual property. It provides information on the following subjects:

- Salaries and wages and other operating expenditures on management of intellectual property (IP);
- Descriptive statistics on number of inventions and types of IP instrument used: patents, copyrights, licenses, etc.;
- Value of research contracts;
- Revenues from royalties and other IP revenues;
- Creation of spinoffs.

The data collected are used by federal science policy analysts to monitor federal government effort to commercialise the intellectual property it generates as well as the application of policies on federal government IP.

Subjects

• Innovation
• Science and technology

Data sources and methodology

Target population

The survey targets federal scientific departments and agencies that manage and commercialise inventions, patents, copyrights, planters' breeding rights or other IP instruments, or that receive research contracts.

Instrument design

The questionnaire is designed to cover federal government IP related activities such as patents, copyrights, planters' breeding rights, revenue from royalties or research contracts, spinoffs, as well as the resources used to engage in such IP related activities.

The last revisions to the questionnaire were made for reference year 2008-2009 in order to streamline the content, in order to minimise response burden and to respond to data quality issues. Those revisions were made in consultation with Industry Canada, the main user, and were tested with representatives from federal scientific base departments who had a thorough knowledge of intellectual property issues.

Sampling

This survey is a census with a cross-sectional design.

Data are collected for all units of the target population, therefore no sampling is done.

The frame of federal scientific base departments that defines the target population is based on the membership list from the Federal Partnership in Technology Transfer (FPTT) and is updated when needed. There are 12 units that are part of the survey.

Data sources

Responding to this survey is mandatory.

Data are collected directly from survey respondents.

This is an annual mail-out /mail-back survey. A PDF version of questionnaire is sent electronically to the representative from each federal department and agency surveyed and it is mailed back or faxed back. Data are collected directly from the respondent.

Prior to mail out the contact person is obtained through pre-contacts with the department in order to find the person most knowledgeable about the IP issues of that department who can fill out the questionnaire.

All units are followed two weeks after initial mail out, with an E-mail reminder. Phone follow-ups for all units start two weeks after the reminder for non response and edit follow-up.

View the Questionnaire(s) and reporting guide(s) .

Disclosure control

Statistics Canada is prohibited by law from releasing any information it collects that could identify any person, business, or organization, unless consent has been given by the respondent or as permitted by the Statistics Act. Various confidentiality rules are applied to all data that are released or published to prevent the publication or disclosure of any information deemed confidential. If necessary, data are suppressed to prevent direct or residual disclosure of identifiable data.

In order to prevent any data disclosure, confidentiality analysis is done using the Statistics Canada Generalized Disclosure Control System (G-Confid). G-Confid is used for primary suppression (direct disclosure) as well as for secondary suppression (residual disclosure). Direct disclosure occurs when the value in a tabulation cell is composed of or dominated by few enterprises while residual disclosure occurs when confidential information can be derived indirectly by piecing together information from different sources or data series.