Original news and analysis on international IP policy
The European Patent Office’s recent revocation of a German company’s patent on a plant extract is being seen by some as a step toward fighting biopiracy related to intellectual property rights. In its 26 January decision, the EPO considered the…
Offering no details - as is their standard - government negotiators for a global anticounterfeiting treaty yesterday declared a commitment to try to find ways to increase transparency and inclusion of public input in the secretive talks. But they stopped short of actually committing to increasing transparency and inclusion.
Standards are vitally important to innovation but in order for them to serve their purpose effectively, they must be open, said a panel at the World Intellectual Property Organization this week.
A high-level task force on the right to development last week released two new reports at the United Nations, the results of technical missions to the World Intellectual Property Organization on its Development Agenda and to the World Health Organization on its strategy on intellectual property.
WASHINGTON, DC - The internet’s technical governing body plans to make a push to educate the global users of the internet on the network’s latest generation technology known as IPv6, Rod Beckstrom, president and CEO of the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN), said this week.
The latest available text on future work at the World Intellectual Property Organization Standing Committee on the Law of Patents is available from the IP Watch website. The draft emerged this evening.
Access and benefit sharing will top agendas at several different intergovernmental bodies this year on issues of biodiversity, environment, food security and traditional knowledge, and stakeholders will be watching the movement across fora of emerging models and potential pitfalls from parallel negotiations.
BRUSSELS - Trade agreements must not contain clauses on intellectual property rights that could imperil the poor’s access to affordable medicines, a veteran member of the European Parliament (MEP) has said.
NEW YORK – The problem of global counterfeiting has not diminished with the new year, experts said here yesterday, and 2010 promises to bring even more rampant intellectual property theft if countries do not do more to stem the problem. Some countries are mobilising to do just that.
Discussions at the World Intellectual Property Organization patent committee this week are focussed on a series of new studies, though one of the more difficult issues on the table - exceptions and limitations to patent law - will not be substantively dealt with until the next meeting in October. Discussions on future work for the committee, with a proposal on the table from Brazil for a new work programme on exceptions and limitations, are soon to begin and are likely to be the most difficult topic of the week.
US software maker Microsoft’s General Counsel Brad Smith in Brussels today proposed a multistakeholder dialogue on cloud computing in Europe aimed at opening up its potential, including through building confidence, government action and harmonisation of national policies. “In Europe and…
Representatives of the World Health Organization and the European pharmaceutical industry today answered questions from the Council of Europe and the press on whether they had mishandled an outbreak of influenza this summer.