Australia is not “lucky” when it comes to innovation. According to Thomson Scientific, it ranked 11th in the world in terms of patents published during 2004. Taiwan, a country comparable in GDP terms, registered more than double Australia’s amount of 4,142.

Chemicals/materials and telecoms/IT are the sectors that dominate Australia’s patent list. Life sciences – seen by experts as the industry of the future – represent only about 15 per cent of patents published.