Europe is the birthplace of intellectual property protection. The first patent law with modern significance is the Statute of Monopolies promulgated by the Parliament of England in 1624. On July 4, 1782, the British inventor James Watts improved design of steam engine was awarded the patent GB1321. This symbolic document became a cornerstone of the industrial revolution, the rise of the British Empire and the construction of a strong patent system. For hundreds of years, Europe has been continuously exploring the international legal framework for international patent operations, from the Paris Convention and the European Patent Convention to the proposed Unitary Patent system, and has in this way made a huge contribution to best practice in the global intellectual property protection system.
In recent years, the combination of Chinas rapid economic growth, the integration of the global economy, and unprecedented technological changes have made global IP policy more important than ever. Western economies see daily evidence of Chinas strategic shift away from low added-value industrial production, through higher-value advanced manufacturing, to becoming the clear global leaders in Artificial Intelligence, with an associated commitment to knowledge creation. The biggest PCT filers in the world are now Chinese, and in turn we at RWS see more and more of our major clients recognizing that to remain competitive it is imperative that they protect their own IP in China, and indeed set up their own Research Development centres here.
We believe that there is great potential both for China to learn from Europes Intellectual Property history and traditions and for Europe to benefit from the massive scale of innovation now originating from China. The transformation of innovation needs language support, and English is the most widely-used language for filing. Although many Chinese nationals speak good English, with large numbers of students majoring in the subject, there is still a considerable talent gap for the task of successfully translating patent examination documents. This is why RWS started to cooperate with universities to train professional linguists.
As early as ten years ago, RWS actively responded to the call of the National MTI Graduate Education Guidance Committee and launched a programme of extensive and in-depth university-enterprise cooperation. We have made great effort to contribute to training talent for the Chinese language service industry, and in so doing have accumulated considerable experience of cooperation ventures in this field. We have established MTI postgraduate training and practice bases jointly with many famous universities in China, and have intensively participated in the practice of postgraduate teaching, combining actual enterprise business with an educational programme for graduate students.
As an international company that has been a leader in the field of patent language services for more than 60 years, RWS has a strong sense of responsibility and mission, and we intend to continue to push the boundaries of educational training. In this way, we aim to cultivate more outstanding talents for the industry and provide the best possible support for innovation in China and the world.