Tongzhou district sets record for IP pledge financing
The Tongzhou district of Nantong city – located in East China's Jiangsu province – provided strong and efficient support for its resident businesses to take advantage of their intellectual property rights last year, helping them transform these IP rights into assets.
Tongzhou firms received 76 loans in 2021 through trademark or patent pledges and the value of those loans topped 529 million yuan ($83.4 million), hitting a new annual high.
In the finance world, intellectual property pledge financing is an important way for innovative companies to access development funds. In a bid to accelerate the two-way transformation of IP rights and assets, Tongzhou district rolled out a slew of subsidy policies last year.
Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, Jiangsu Greeo Agricultural Technology Development Co Ltd, based in Tongzhou, saw its commercial fortunes decline sharply last year, putting it in urgent need of funds to advance an expansion project.
Hearing about its difficulties, the district's market supervision bureau visited the firm several times and helped it obtain a loan of 20 million yuan through pledging the company's trademark.
Moving forward, plans are for the market supervision bureau to build an IP rights trading service platform and construct a service system that integrates value assessments, guarantees, loans, filings and the management of intellectual property rights. This will optimize conditions and better serve resident firms, according to an official at the bureau.
