Original news and analysis on international IP policy
COPENHAGEN - While sales of insecticide-treated bed nets have skyrocketed in recent years and boosting their use is among the UN Millennium Development Goals, two producers of the nets have been caught in a rigorous legal case involving trade secrets. Now the English High Court has ruled that one of the companies, Bestnet, has misused the trade secrets of the other company, Vestergaard Frandsen (VF).
The Intellectual Property Watch Monthly Edition features top news on international IP policymaking, the latest on who is coming and going in the international IP community, news briefs and more. The July edition is now available for subscribers.
With three important processes coming to a head at the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) this year, it is difficult not to overlook some changes in the private body, which oversees the internet domain name system. At ICANN's recent board meeting, the appointment of a shiny new CEO, former United States Homeland Security Department cybersecurity director Rod Beckstrom, drew attention away from top issues, which include the introduction of new top-level domains, ongoing institutional reform, and the looming September expiration of the ICANN-US government agreement.
A recent United States Supreme Court order letting stand a decision that a proposed remote digital video recorder does not violate copyright law has major implications for internet “cloud computing” and advertisers, intellectual property lawyers say.
COPENHAGEN - A top priority for Sweden as it takes over the EU presidency on 1 July is to boost negotiations on a Community patent system and a European Patent Court, the government says. Its work programme also emphasises the need for "effective protection of intellectual property rights" and lists a conference on enforcement. Officials, however, deny that enforcement is among the presidency's main IP focus. And the Pirate Party is concerned.
TERUEL, SPAIN - Geographical indications (GIs) are in the interest of both producers and consumers as they provide a tool for sustainable economic growth and offer a guarantee of quality, concluded a high-level meeting of GI proponents last week. However, with shortcomings in the international framework and a lack of consensus on GIs, countries have been trying to find legal ways to address the issue.
A well-liked and influential IP policymaker in Geneva will head Chile’s national IP office, a US lawyer responsible for perhaps the world’s biggest industry patent portfolio will head the US IP office, and a fixture in the Geneva international trade negotiating and lobbying community is heading home to Canada.
LAUSANNE - One should not waste a good crisis, goes the common wisdom - a piece of advice policymakers might use to spur the world closer to a green, knowledge-based economy, said a panel at the Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne Wednesday. The current financial crisis and an awakening recognition of the ecological crisis have presented a unique opportunity for innovation - and particularly green innovation - to take a lead role in driving future economies.
The coming months could spell changes in the long-running World Trade Organization talks on creating a register for wines and spirits geographical indications and amending WTO rules to better protect biodiversity rights. Developed countries that have been blocking progress on the issues for years may be pushed at a political level, according to some sources.
The Intellectual Property Watch Monthly Edition features top news on international IP policymaking, the latest on who is coming and going in the international IP community, news briefs and more. The June edition is now available for subscribers.
A well-known European economist has been named the first-ever Chief Economist at the World Intellectual Property Organization, according to sources.
The World Intellectual Property Organization is expected this month to create a new deputy director general for global challenges, and will raise trademarks to the DDG level while moving copyright responsibility back to the assistant director general level, according to sources at WIPO. The appointments have not been finalised and consultations may be continuing.