Original news and analysis on international IP policy
The new Anton Mostert Chair of Intellectual Property Law at the University of Stellenbosch in South Africa, Professor Sadulla Karjiker, has pointed a finger at the country’s Department of Trade and Industry (DTI) for being “unresponsive” to stakeholders offering their input into proposed IP legislation.
That the Indian government has been under pressure from the United States to change its patent regime is no secret among those who follow the public discourse on intellectual property rights. Now, a new controversy about India’s alleged private assurance to the US-India Business Council (USIBC) and other lobby groups that it would not invoke compulsory licensing for commercial purposes seeks to add fuel to fiery speculation about a shift in India’s policy on IPR.
DAKAR, Senegal – Rachel Sibande won accolades when she started Malawi’s first ever technology start-up mHub in 2013.
Public health advocates, academics, patients, governments and others this week presented further ideas to the United Nations Secretary-General’s High-Level Panel on Access to Medicines on ways to break the longstanding pattern of expensive medical products around the world as a way to pay for research and development.
The World Trade Organization said today that momentum continues to build among member states to accept a public health amendment to the WTO intellectual property rights agreement, as three more countries adopted it in the past week.
Speakers from Asian civil society provided recommendations to the public hearing of the United Nations Secretary General’s High-Level Panel on Access to Medicines held yesterday. They underlined the unaffordability of medicines in their countries, the inefficiency of current mechanisms such as voluntary licensing, and the pressure applied by pharmaceutical companies and the United States and Europe to prevent the use of compulsory licences. One speaker warned against the expert advice given by the World Intellectual Property Organization to least-developed countries, while others pointed to stringent intellectual property measures in free-trade agreements.
The World Intellectual Property Organization has released data on disputes between trademark owners and third parties who are registering new domain names with the original brand name. Disputes are on the rise and the proportion relating to new generic top-level domain names is growing, it found. Fashion and banking are the prominent areas for disputes.
Witnesses testifying at the United States House Communications and Technology Subcommittee today unanimously reported success of the multistakeholder preparations for the transition of oversight over the Internet Assigned Numbers Authority (IANA) from the US government to the multistakeholder internet community.
Today in Johannesburg, South Africa, the second of two public dialogues was held by the United Nations Secretary General’s High-Level Panel on Access to Medicines, drawing another packed room and many ideas, experiences and suggestions for solutions.
China, Japan and South Korea are among the top five countries filing international patent applications at the World Intellectual Property Organization, while the United States continues to lead in patent and trademark applications. Far behind, developing countries seem to be having a hard time catching up.
The United States government has increasingly engaged India on intellectual property rights and other trade issues in recent years, and US negotiators are under still more pressure to include industry in this engagement and deliver more results, a recent letter from 14 members of the US Congress shows.
The Obama administration last week published a draft software source code policy that requires all government agencies to publish their custom-build software as free software for public use, according to the Free Software Foundation Europe (FSFE).