The ELKH Research Centre for Natural Sciences (TTK) has received the Millennium Award from the National Intellectual Property Office (SZTNH) for outstanding research work related to the protection of intellectual property in the institution. On September 2, 2021, the director of the institution, Dr László Buday, received the recognition at an awards ceremony.
The legal predecessor of the SZTNH, the Hungarian Patent Office, established the Millennium Award in the year of the millennium, 2000. It recognizes institutions and organizations that are exemplary in the protection of intellectual property.
At the awards ceremony held at the Moholy-Nagy University of Arts (MOME) this year, in addition to TTK, the Cirko Film – Másképp Alapítvány, the weekly magazine Élet és Tudomány, the Hungarian Design Cultural Foundation, REGIO Mängkereskedelmi Kft., the Sanofi pharmaceutical factory and the band Tankcsapda also received the Millennium Prize.
In the two decades since the award was established, 83 outstanding Hungarian intellectual and cultural groups, including companies with a valuable intellectual property portfolio, research institutes, cultural institutions and creative workshops, have received the award.
Gyula Pomázi, the president of the SZTNH, emphasized in a statement issued to MTI that the office is working to ensure that as many people as possible receive protection for their innovations as the economy restarts. He added that the intellectual property protection activity of domestic applicants in Hungary has been on the rise in recent years, with the number of industrial property rights applications filed nationally increasing for almost all forms of protection.
In his speech, Ádám Nagy, Deputy State Secretary for Industry Strategies and Regulation of the Hungary Ministry of Innovation and Technology (ITM), emphasized that the existence of intellectual property is a key element in the competitiveness of enterprises. One of the keys to the relaunch of the Hungarian economy is that the ideas and technological developments of Hungarian companies – as factors determining competitiveness – make the breakthrough into the market.