The vital spark

Name: Lu Papi

Business: Lu Papi and Associates

Industry: Generating IP by fulfilling ideas from concept to manufacturing

Lu Papi’s dream of turning ideas into innovations has become a reality. His company is revolutionising the development and subsequent protection of both local and international products.

An Italian factory floor was the playground of a young Lu Papi. It also began a journey that would eventually place his company as one of the few in Australia that genuinely assists in the evolution of ideas into commercial reality.

Leaving Rome in the late seventies, Papi took up residency in Australia. These days his fertile mind is given full scope on an expansive acreage in Cobbity, New South Wales, where he tends to his cattle and operates his business, Lu Papi & Associates.

Refining an idea
Papi, a mechanical engineer who studied in Italy to enhance the knowledge gained in his Grandfather’s factory, heads up an innovation research and development (R&D) company that assists inventors and corporations who want to breathe commercial life into their ideas.

“We fulfil an idea from the concept stage to the manufacturing stage for a variety of clients,” says Papi. “A client comes to us with some preliminary ideas of what they’d like to do and we assess what they’ve already achieved and what they’d like to do in the long term.”

By way of example, Papi explains the work done in Australia for the US franchise Crime Stoppers. “Crime Stoppers needed to create a product to protect a person who was arrested from being recognised, so we worked with them to develop a hood. Our business is a little strange to describe because we work closely with so many different types of clients to help them refine an idea, or to get an idea to the prototype stage,” he says.

“All the work we do involves the protection of intellectual property (IP). We work closely with our patent and trade mark attorneys (Griffith Hack) to ensure that we do the required checks and obtain the necessary protection for our clients,” Papi explains. “We want to make sure our clients gain the most benefit from the exercise so we sign confidentiality agreements and assign the IP to them once the work is completed and all money has changed hands.”

“Before we start work on any new idea presented to us we have our patent attorneys perform a patent clearance search, most importantly to make sure that we don’t conflict with someone’s prior rights. However, this also gives us a feel for the patentable features of any new design we come up with. Then, at a fairly early stage in the procedure, we recommend to our clients to have a provisional patent application professionally drafted and filed to establish an internationally recognised “priority date” for the new idea.”

Award-winning innovation
Papi’s business has won numerous awards, including the Most Outstanding Innovator in the Innovation Category of the Western Sydney Industry Awards in 2002, and the Macquarie Graduate School of Management’s award for the 2002 Alumnus of the Year for Outstanding Professional Achievement.

The range of products that Papi has worked with is diverse: from chairs in Sydney’s Olympic Stadium and urine sample jars for women with a collapsible funnel, to batteries for electric cars and bathroom accessories.

“Some ideas result from bouncing thoughts around,” says Papi. “I’m a left hander who was forced to use my right hand and my brain works in two or three different directions. I think in a different way and, with other expertise, we’re able to provide solutions for our clients. I cover all the engineering aspects and drive the project, but I employ large industrial design companies to find expertise I can utilise.”

“We’ve put a lot of research into selecting other people and companies who have the specialised knowledge we lack. We use their services regularly to provide things like engineering analysis, materials science, materials testing, expertise in various types of polymer processing, and so on. We regard them as associates and have a good understanding with them all. At times we might have as many as 45-50 people working on a single project.”

Doing things differently
While refining designs and working on innovations for clients makes up a substantial part of his business, Papi has conjured up valuable innovations for himself, with the two most notable being the provisional patents he has secured over a new type of syringe and a wheelchair.

“It’s funny where ideas start,” he says. “I was watching the vet use a syringe on one of our cattle here at the farm and saw him working awkwardly with a typical syringe while he was up to his knees in cow dung.

“So after some thought and sketches I came up with the idea of a syringe within a syringe.”

To secure his idea, he described the process to Griffith Hack in order to gain an understanding of the needs of the patent, then he prepared sequential computer schedules to explain how the product would work – Papi undertook post graduate studies at Macquarie University in technical management – as well as a verbal description of the process to be patented.

“But before that we do a lot of research tying to understand what other people have done in the area. We use other people’s IP – not to copy it, but to find the gaps we can fill. People often don’t realise that to ensure their IP is strong you should see what’s already out there.”

Innovation for the people
In order to capitalise on a dream 25 years in the making, Papi was able to secure a government grant to develop innovations on a wheelchair.

“I always believed wheelchairs don’t meet the user’s need. We brought a wheelchair into the office here and could see how difficult it was to manoeuvre – and it didn’t even have a place for a person to put their belongings in.

“At the moment we have provisional patents on both our products. We will soon have to decide about countries in which we’ll extend the protection. We’ll probably not take worldwide coverage, as it is too expensive for us, but will choose to protect ourselves in the US, Europe and Japan via a patent cooperation treaty application.”

From dream to reality
Papi’s dream is to run a medium-sized company working exclusively in innovation R&D with hand-picked designers and engineers, and having the in-house capacity to produce prototypes, rapid prototypes and pilot runs of new products.

“As far as I know no such company exists in Australia because by world standards Australian companies invest very little in innovation and R&D.

“Anyone can do this job but my advantage is that I have life experience. There’s always challenge and opportunity – which keeps me young and happy all the time.”