In a war of attrition against a government agency, the underdog rarely comes out a winner — a lesson harshly demonstrated upon local inventor Dr Ting Choon Meng.
Following the Sept 11 terrorist attacks in New York, Dr Ting and his partners designed and produced the Station With Immediate First-Aid Treatment (SWIFT), a mobile first-aid station that can be deployed to manage and treat casualties in times of crisis. He applied for patent rights to his inventions and successfully obtained the rights to intellectual property in countries such as Australia, Japan, Israel, Taiwan, Malaysia, the United States of America and Europe and more, including Singapore as well in 2005.
The Singapore Civil Defence Force took a liking to his invention and paid the inventors royalties to utilize their SWIFT invention to use a deployable mobile hospital, and is still in active service today.
However, the bad news started when the Ministry of Defence (Mindef) took notice of the SWIFT vehicle and wanted to modify it for their own needs. Dr Ting noted that the chief of the SAF Medical Corps was interested in the vehicle but did not like the fact that it was patented.
Later on, the inventors received a rude shock when they found out that Mindef had gone ahead and built their own mobile first-aid post without consulting the original makers. In 2012, they sued the government for blatantly infringing upon their intellectual property.
In Dr Ting's recent account of Mindef's alleged bullying tactics on The Online Citizen, the doctor details the factors that lead him to withdraw his lawsuit two years on.
Mindef kept delaying the case and had the backing of the Attorney General along with law firm Wong & Leow, forcing the case to drag on for two years, inflicting heavy legal fees upon Dr Ting.
Adding salt to the wound, Mindef ordered him to pay for their legal costs, drop all claims to his intellectual property and surrender his patent for his invention in Singapore and seven other countries. A legal bill of $580,000 was imposed on the doctor, forcing him to put his company MobileStats Technologies in receivership.
Mindef however has refuted the allegations through the Facebook page of their online magazine CyberPioneer with a detailed, point-by-point post listing how all Dr Ting's arguments are invalid. "It sounds like a great story, but all these accusations are false and baseless," they challenged.
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Post by cyberpioneer.
Dr Ting and The Online Citizen have yet to reply.
Photo: Kenneth Lai
In a war of attrition against a government agency, the underdog rarely comes out a winner — a lesson harshly demonstrated upon local inventor Dr Ting Choon Meng.
Following the Sept 11 terrorist attacks in New York, Dr Ting and his partners designed and produced the Station With Immediate First-Aid Treatment (SWIFT), a mobile first-aid station that can be deployed to manage and treat casualties in times of crisis. He applied for patent rights to his inventions and successfully obtained the rights to intellectual property in countries such as Australia, Japan, Israel, Taiwan, Malaysia, the United States of America and Europe and more, including Singapore as well in 2005.
The Singapore Civil Defence Force took a liking to his invention and paid the inventors royalties to utilize their SWIFT invention to use a deployable mobile hospital, and is still in active service today.
However, the bad news started when the Ministry of Defence (Mindef) took notice of the SWIFT vehicle and wanted to modify it for their own needs. Dr Ting noted that the chief of the SAF Medical Corps was interested in the vehicle but did not like the fact that it was patented.
Later on, the inventors received a rude shock when they found out that Mindef had gone ahead and built their own mobile first-aid post without consulting the original makers. In 2012, they sued the government for blatantly infringing upon their intellectual property.
In Dr Ting's recent account of Mindef's alleged bullying tactics on The Online Citizen, the doctor details the factors that lead him to withdraw his lawsuit two years on.
Mindef kept delaying the case and had the backing of the Attorney General along with law firm Wong & Leow, forcing the case to drag on for two years, inflicting heavy legal fees upon Dr Ting.
Adding salt to the wound, Mindef ordered him to pay for their legal costs, drop all claims to his intellectual property and surrender his patent for his invention in Singapore and seven other countries. A legal bill of $580,000 was imposed on the doctor, forcing him to put his company MobileStats Technologies in receivership.
Mindef however has refuted the allegations through the Facebook page of their online magazine CyberPioneer with a detailed, point-by-point post listing how all Dr Ting's arguments are invalid. "It sounds like a great story, but all these accusations are false and baseless," they challenged.
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Post by cyberpioneer.
Dr Ting and The Online Citizen have yet to reply.
Photo: Kenneth Lai