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sep-symposium-2025-1920

WIPO Symposium on Standard Essential Patents

A September Symphony

Do you hear the music of SEPs?

SEPs and music may not be an evident connection. But think of digital broadcasting, MP3 or simply listening to music on your smartphone with a connected headset. All of this is made possible through standardization. Therefore, in the year of IP and Music, WIPO conducts a global orchestra to play a SEP Symphony. The opus is a vivacious one, with some modernist dissonances and fugue-like elements, but if played well, it all ends in harmony.

To provide a global platform of dialogue under the WIPO Strategy on Standard Essential Patents 2024-26, this Symposium on Standard Essential Patents will gather stakeholders of very different types from across the globe to share their insights on aspects related to policy, law, and economics of SEPs and their licensing – not only for musical technology.   

Live performances are always better – for music but also for SEP discussions. To this end, the Symposium will be held in person at the headquarters of WIPO in Geneva. Attending the Symposium is open to any interested party with no conference fee incurred, upon registration. However, if you only wish to get a sound sample, there will be a possibility of watching the plenary sessions through webcasting.

Register

Program

The live discussions will promote understanding on the unique characteristics of SEPs; explore the respective roles of standard development organizations, regulators, courts, and market mechanisms in the area; enable expert exchanges; cover the dynamics around lesser discussed standards; and inform topical issues relating to standard essential patents both in policy and in practice. The plenary sessions will be complemented with workshops under Chatham House rules to provide a space for different beats.

If these are the tunes that make you swoon or tap rhythmically, or you wish to join in with your own instrument, don’t miss out and secure your place in the WIPO Conference Hall to experience this symphonic event that puts the SEP in September.

  • Provisional program [PDF]

September 18 and 19, 2025

Location: Geneva, Switzerland