WIPO Director General Gurry on Technology and the IP System

September 26, 2019

WIPO Director General Francis Gurry gave a keynote address at the “IP HORIZON 5.0 – Mapping Opportunities and Challenges for Intellectual Property in a Globalised Economy” Conference, organized by the European Union Intellectual Property Office (EUIPO) and the McCarthy Institute. The conference was held on September 26 and 27, 2019, in Alicante, Spain.

In his address, Mr. Gurry said the speed of technological development made its impact on the future of the intellectual property (IP) system hard to predict.

Photo of Francis Gurry at IP Horizon 5.0 — (Photo: Courtesy of EUIPO)

I think the essence of today’s situation is that we do not have the luxury of being able to conceptualize what has happened before a new set of events is upon us.
WIPO Director General Francis Gurry

Among a range of topics, Mr. Gurry explored three areas where new technologies were having notable impacts:

IP administration
IP policy
the politics of IP

Some selections from Mr. Gurry’s speech

On IP administration

The administration is probably the easiest of three extremely difficult issues. Now, in terms of the administration of intellectual property, and I suppose you might say also the use of intellectual property, I think we've got what we've got is at least three challenges, and they are volume, language and speed.

On IP policy

I think the fundamental question that we have is: Is intellectual property serving innovation in the digital economy? That's the fundamental thing that we have to keep our eye on because that's why we have intellectual property.

On IP politics

I think if we look around now we see “techlash,” as the term is now known. We do see a techlash, tech backlash, developing in certain parts of the world. And this is going to involve not just technologies but intellectual property as well.