The fifteen candidates for the post of Director General of the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) met with representatives of member states on April 14, 2008, each outlining his or her respective platform and responding to pre-submitted questions from the different regional groups. The Chairperson of the Coordination Committee - following informal consultations last month with representatives of the 83 member body that will nominate a candidate in May for appointment to this position by the WIPO General Assembly in September 2008 - decided on arrangements for the one day informal meeting to give an opportunity for candidates to present themselves and respond to questions.
The World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) signed this week separate cooperation agreements with two leading educational institutions in Mexico – the Technological Institute of Monterrey and the University of Guadalajara – to advance the teaching of intellectual property.
The World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) presented two awards at the Geneva International Exhibition of Inventions on April 4, 2008, as part of the Organization’s commitment to promoting recognition of inventors worldwide.
A one-day meeting of an extraordinary session of the World Intellectual Property Organization’s (WIPO) Assemblies on March 31, 2008 ended with agreement to adopt the Organization’s program and budget for 2008/09, as well as a 5% decrease in fees paid for international patent applications.
Against the background of an unprecedented number of cybersquatting cases in 2007, the evolving nature of the domain name registration system (DNS) is causing growing concern for trademark owners around the world. Last year, a record 2,156 complaints alleging cybersquatting – or the abusive registration of trademarks on the Internet - were filed with the World Intellectual Property Organization’s (WIPO) Arbitration and Mediation Center (Center), representing an 18% increase over 2006 and a 48% increase over 2005 in the number of generic and country code Top Level Domain (gTLDs and ccTLDs) disputes (see Table 1).
The Director General of the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO), Dr. Kamil Idris, today hailed the 125th anniversary of the signing of the Paris Convention for the Protection of Industrial Property. The so-called “Paris Convention” was signed in the French capital on 20 March, 1883 and is widely considered as the cornerstone of the international industrial property system. One of the main features of the treaty is that it establishes international standards requiring countries to apply the same level of protection to nationals of other contracting parties as they apply to their own nationals.
As a response to the growing demand from the business community for executive programs on intellectual property (IP) management, the WIPO Worldwide Academy and the Kellogg School of Management - a leading business school - have teamed up for the second year running to offer the 2008 executive program on "Strategies for Management of Intellectual Property". This year’s program will be held at the Kellogg Campus in Chicago from June 9 to 12, 2008.
Member states of the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) agreed this week on elements of a program of work for the Standing Committee on Copyright and Related Rights (SCCR). Meeting from March 10-12, 2008, the SCCR decided that it would continue to address issues such as the protection of broadcasting organizations and the protection of audiovisual performances, as well as exceptions and limitations.
The Committee on Development and Intellectual Property (CDIP), established by the General Assembly of the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) in October 2007, held its first meeting from March 3 to 7, 2008 and moved forward in discussing the implementation of the WIPO Development Agenda (summary by the Chair below). The meeting, which was attended by 100 member states, 7 inter-governmental organizations and 30 non-governmental organizations, adopted the rules of procedure of the CDIP and held detailed discussions on developing a work program for implementation of the recommendations approved by the General Assembly.
WIPO Director General, Dr. Kamil Idris met, on Thursday, 6 March 2008, with a high-level Ghanaian delegation led by H.E. Mr. Ambrose Dery, Minister of State, Ministry of Justice and Attorney General’s Department of the Republic of Ghana, to discuss the use of intellectual property (IP) as a strategically important tool for development and on ways in which WIPO could further support Ghana in promoting effective utilization of the IP system for development.