Expert discussion with the creative academic staff of the department.

On April 25, 2016, the Department of Economics and Economy commemorated the 136th anniversary of the birth of Gideon Sundback and discussed the subject of innovations and patents in the past, present and future direction.

On April 29, 1913, in the USA, the patent for the invention of a zipper was granted to the Swedish engineer Gideon Sundback, who used the original principle of the zipper (invented by an American Whitcomb L. Judson, 1893) and improved the zip fastening to its current form - invented a zipper with two facing rows of teeth (hookless fastener); after further improvements in 1917, he was granted a patent for another zipper (separable fastener). His zippers were firstly used by soldiers during the First World War and he received the Gold Medal of the Royal Swedish Academy of Engineering (1951). In 2006 he was inducted into the National Inventors Hall of Fame for his work on development of the zipper. Gideon Sundback was a Swedish engineer who was born into a farming family on April 24, 1880. Later he studied at the polytechnic school in Germany and in 1905 emigrated to the United States.

The month of April is also known for the fact that on April 3, 1973, a researcher and manager in Motorola, Martin Cooper, made the first call with a mobile phone in New York (the device was 25 cm high and weighed almost 1kg), Mobile phones did not come into common use until the next decade.

At present, there has been a debate about what the future could be like without patent protection. It is clear that patents in their current form are not suitable for all sectors of the economy and have mixed

effects on the economy and its subsequent growth. The near future will probably confirm the assumption that the longer the duration of the patent protection, the more it inhibit the innovation.