Original news and analysis on international IP policy
Members of the World Intellectual Property Organisation (WIPO) on Friday failed to agree on the proper role for a permanent committee on technical cooperation that could impact larger efforts by some to reform WIPO toward development issues. Debate focused on…
Non-governmental organisations from across the spectrum were elbow to elbow with members of the World Intellectual Property Organisation (WIPO) this week as they wrestled with a proposal for an agenda to increase attention to the needs of developing countries. Private…
World Intellectual Property Organisation members late Wednesday night agreed to continue discussing a proposal to more deeply infuse developing country needs into the mission of the UN body. After three full days of closed-door meetings – much of them in…
Developed and developing countries faced off Monday over whether and how the U.N. World Intellectual Property Organisation’s mission should be transformed to better address the needs of developing countries. The basis for the three-day discussion ending Wednesday at the Geneva-based…
India, a critical player in policy debates at the World Intellectual Property Organisation, has announced its opposition to a recommendation on global patent harmonisation backed by a select group of countries in a February consultation with WIPO Director General Kamil…
On the eve of high-level meetings next week on development and intellectual property, the fourteen co-sponsors of the proposal for the World Intellectual Property Organisation’s new Development Agenda today submitted detailed elaborations of their proposals for incorporating development into WIPO’s…
Negotiators attending closed meetings at a UN body in Geneva in mid-April could shape the policy agenda for development and intellectual property for years to come, participants and observers say. It is not clear how the consecutive meetings at the…
A key group of developing countries this week sent a potential shockwave through fledgling efforts at the World Intellectual Property Organisation to restart talks on the international harmonisation of national patent laws. The 14-member “Group of Friends of Development” issued…
The World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) has come under fire from non-governmental organizations (NGOs) fearing exclusion from key meetings in April on WIPO’s Development Agenda. But a spokeswoman from the Geneva-based U.N. body on Wednesday said it is complying with…
The World Intellectual Property Organisation on Friday announced a recommended path for future work on harmonising patent laws around the world. The announcement came after a two-day informal consultation with WIPO Director General Kamil Idris and a group of mostly…
A group of nations hand-picked by the head of the World Intellectual Property Organisation on Thursday concluded informal consultations on ways to move the harmonisation of national patent regimes forward while addressing development concerns of some countries seen as delaying…
Intellectual property experts from a wide range of backgrounds are finding common ground in informal proposals to ensure the right of individuals to access knowledge, including possibly through a negotiated treaty at the U.N. The issue has come of age…