MAFE’s method for commercialization of inventions

Written by András VEDRES PhD
(Secretary General of Association of Hungarian Inventors; MAFE)

The environment and conditions of commercialization

One of the great contradictions of our globalizing world is that production and trade is concentrated in the hands of global enterprises, while inventions and art are created by individuals, who, in most of the cases are not affiliated with any such global enterprises.
The realization of creations – in this case the commercialization of inventions – is a one way street leading from the inventor/patent owner to the global enterprises, the costs of which is supposed to be covered by the inventor. In most of the cases, the inventor lacks the capital to cover these costs. A global enterprise never makes any steps towards the inventors.
The interest of the public is that inventions are realized in the greatest possible number.
This means that the initial costs for realizing inventions should be paid from public-purpose money, that is taxes. There are only a few countries with such a practice. In Hungary the state provides only little support to the realization of inventions. The most important aim of the Association of Hungarian Inventors (MAFE) is to help the commercialization of inventions. To accomplish this our association receives significant support from its members. MAFE has worked out a cheap and efficient method to commercialize inventions over the last decade. Let me outline this method.

The selection of inventions

Great attention and thought needs to be given to select which inventions should MAFE support in the first place, since our resources for commercialization are scarce. The first phase of this selection is the collection of inventions. The best venue for this selection is an exhibition of inventions. MAFE has organized five exhibitions over the last decade with
1500 Hungarian inventions (see table 1). There was a jury on each of these exhibitions evaluating inventions. The competition of inventions was made international; there were
800 foreign inventions displayed overall. We have selected inventions to commercialize out of the winners of these competitions. The majority of the selected inventions (80%) were such that there was a tangible product to display. The main criteria for the selection of these inventions was the probability that the product they represent will sell.

We provided free stands for independent inventors and members of the IFIA on these exhibitions. These GENIUS exhibitions themselves started the realization of hundreds
of successful inventions. These exhibitions also served the purpose to publicize the work of IFIA and the international inventors’ movement, and to increase the security of intellectual property rights. For example after the 4^th GENIUS International Inventions Exhibition more than 50 news (newspaper article, radio and  TV reportage) mentioned “IFIA”, “IFIS” and “WIPO” words.

MAFE has used part of the support from the Hungarian state to help IFIA members. For example on the 4^th GENIUS International Inventions Exhibition MAFE members had displayed 210 inventions, while IFIA members (together with the 71 IFIS offers) displayed 127 inventions. Exhibition space was free, the posters of IFIS offers were prepared by MAFE, and the accommodation costs of foreign participants (3 647 USD) were also paid for by MAFE. So 37% of the overall costs (45 339 USD of 120 519 USD) was support for IFIA membership.

Table 1

Invention exhibitions organized by MAFE

Foreign exhibitions

We provided consultation for the chosen inventions to help obtain proper international protection. In preparing brochures we encouraged using the IFIS offer scheme. We were engaged in planning the materials, products to be displayed at future exhibitions. Posters were produced by MAFE in all of the cases so that MAFE displays have a coherent design. MAFE took care of the formalities of participating in foreign exhibitions, organized and provided transportation and multi-lingual personal presentation of the inventions. Only about 10-20% of inventors took part in the exhibition themselves, mostly due to high travel and accommodation expenses and linguistic difficulties. The foreign exhibition that we took part in were of four categories. The first category is exhibition organized for profit by a specialized enterprise. We have participated in almost all of the major exhibitions in this category. The major for-profit exhibitions differ in terms of exhibitors and audience. The Salon of Geneva and Brussels EUREKA feature predominantly foreign exhibitors, with mostly French businessmen as audience. Nuremberg IENA features mostly German inventors, less Slavic countries and more far-eastern exhibitors. The exhibitions in the US Yankee and in the UK are mostly for local exhibitors. MAFE presentation in 2000: Gdansk Tripoli Nuremberg Brussels

Our experience is that the number of potential investors seeking promising inventions on these exhibitions have decreased with globalization. We had returned home with 500 name cards of potential investors for ten inventions ten years ago. Today there are only 5 with serious interests. The most important benefit of these shows today is the prizes awarded by juries.

The second major category of exhibitions are the specialized exhibitions for certain products or industries. MAFE has participated in various such exhibitions (in Hanover, Basel, Milan, Leipzig) with inventions in the given category. These participations were of little success, inventions (and an inventors’ association) were considered as a strange kind of animal, there were no chances for business or prizes.

The third category is specifically Hungarian displays of inventions in foreign countries. These were organized by one of the Hungarian consulates or embassies (e.g. in Seoul, Tel-Aviv, Sophia), and the exhibition was paired with cultural events. The success of these in terms of business contacts depended heavily on the preparation of these events. Our participation in these were fully covered.

The fourth, last category of exhibitions is the ones organized by sister organizations. MAFE participated in many of these (Beijing, Hong Kong, Manila, Belgrade, Szabadka, Zagreb, Damascus, Gdansk, Gdynia). Unfortunately typically there are very few visitors at these exhibitions. With well prepared exhibitions there are more (e.g. in Beijing, Damascus). Because MAFE provides free stand space for all sister organizations participating in MAFE organized exhibitions, we don’t participate in exhibitions where stand space is charged for. (This is the reason for not participating this year in Seoul.)

We can give examples for virtual presentation: 
Hungarian Virtual Presentation for Hong Kong IN & GREEN International Invention Fair or at now for SIIF. 
These are a new method for cheap and simply participation. The reflections were very positive after our first virtual presentation in Hong Kong and in Hungary.

The benefits of exhibitions

There were very few licenses sold as a result of exhibition participation. The typical is selling of a patented product. If there was no patent in the country of the exhibition, there was no business. The most important benefit of these exhibitions were captioning of the attention of the media, having advertisement for inventions for free. Inventions achieving success at foreign exhibitions were featured in the media attracting investors and potential consumers. There were hundreds of inventions that managed to find an interested investor at home and start or boost production. We have made some of these inventors as “stars” in the media (e.g. by giving the title “inventor of the year”) that especially attracted investors.

 Other means

We have been using the Internet as a tool for commercializing inventions for four years now. We created virtual versions of the GENIUS exhibitions on our website (GENIUS International Internet Fair of Inventions). We also display the Hungarian inventions that we present at foreign exhibitions. Interested investors contact the inventors directly, so we know little about the visitors.

MAFE presentations in 2000: Gdansk Tripoli Nuremberg Brussels

MAFE presentations in 2001: Gdansk Nuremberg,  Brussels   Geneva  Damascus

MAFE presentations in 2002: Yankee  Nuremberg  Brussels  Hong Kong Hungarian Virtual Presentation

MAFE created an Inventions Shop on its website in Hungarian only (ITB.) We offer products based on inventions (mostly toys and household items – 19 altogether) that you can order online. We have a moderate interest already given that this is a new feature (10-20 buyers a month).

We strive to increase the popularity of our website. There is a new program on the number 1 public TV channel “Navigator” that features new technologies and inventions. At the end of each show there is a puzzle – a picture of an invention from our website. You can choose the right answer from three options to say what the invention is about to win a dinner at a restaurant. This leads to an increasing number of hits on our website. We had near 17 000 hits for our site over the last two years. There were 5 100 visitors on the English version of the site.

Another idea to increase the popularity of our website is that we have organized an online art exhibition of the paintings on one of our members. It will be opened by Dr. Péter Medgyessy, the Prime Minister of Hungary on December 18.

 The success of our method

With the means outline above we have contribute to the fact that the overall realization rate of inventions is around 10-20 % in Hungary with minimal, 50-150 thousand USD costs.

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