Inventors serving in the military will be eligible to receive rewards for their innovations

Service members who develop technological solutions for the military will be entitled to fair remuneration, enabling the state to scale these innovations more effectively. These changes are being initiated under the leadership of Deputy Defence Minister Valerii Churkin, with the Ministry of Defence collaborating with the professional community.

Today, military personnel from scientific institutions, specialized technology centers, technical workshops, and other Defense Forces units continuously develop solutions to eliminate the enemy. However, the intellectual property rights to these solutions remain unprotected, unlike in the civilian sector.

To address this issue, two draft laws, No. 13110 and No. 13111, proposing amendments to the Civil Code of Ukraine and relevant legislation, have been registered in the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine. They establish the following allocation of intellectual property rights:

• Personal non-property rights, including authorship and the preservation of the work’s integrity, will be retained by a service member identified as the author or inventor of the object;
• Property rights, including use and licensing, will be acquired by the state through the Ministry of Defence or another relevant body where the individual is serving.

The legislative amendments will guarantee fair compensation to military personnel for the intellectual property they create. The amendments will remove barriers to scaling technological solutions by granting the Ministry of Defence explicit licensing authority.

“With technologies being created, tested, and refined on the battlefield, protecting intellectual property rights is one of the key priorities for the nation's defense capabilities. The Ministry of Defence is dedicated to guaranteeing fair rewards for those who generate technological superiority at the front through their intellect and talent, protecting the rights to these innovations, and facilitating their scalability,” said Valerii Churkin.

The draft laws were developed jointly by the Intellectual Property Department of the Main Directorate of Military Justice, the Ukrainian National Office for Intellectual Property and Innovations (UANIPIO), and the Institute of Lawmaking and Scientific-Legal Experts of the National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine. These changes will be the first step towards modernizing the regulatory framework for intellectual property in military service.