Report on Interaction of IP and Private International Law Now Available

September 11, 2015

With the aim to contribute to forming a factual and practical overview of the approaches taken by courts in addressing the interaction of private international law and IP, WIPO collected information on court judgments addressing “private international law issues in online IP infringement with cross-border elements”. The data was analyzed and the resulting report is now available for download .

Intellectual property (IP) rights are territorial. That means that protecting these rights takes place through national or regional legislation, and within defined territorial borders. Yet IP assets are of a global character and their usage is not limited by territorial boundaries. Thanks to globalization, ever-closer economic integration, and fast-moving digitization, challenges surrounding the interaction between IP and private international law are inevitably becoming ever more frequent and acute. Indeed IP infringements routinely impact on multiple territories, resulting in questions of jurisdiction, applicable law, and enforcement and recognition of foreign judgments.

This new report entitled “Private International Law Issues in Online Intellectual Property Infringement Disputes with Cross-Border Elements – An Analysis of National Approaches” addresses these issues and draws on data collected from the following national experts:

The data was analyzed by Professor Andrew Christie of the Melbourne Law School and the report features both quantitative and qualitative analyses based on the case law data collected.

WIPO-ILA Seminar on IP and Private International Law

The interface between IP and private international law was also addressed at the Seminar on IP and Private International Law, which took place on January 16, 2015, and which was organized jointly by WIPO and the International Law Association (ILA) . This Seminar addressed the role of WIPO and of the Hague Conference on Private International Law (HCCH) in this area. Various soft law initiatives proposing normative frameworks for the adjudication of cross-border IP disputes or aiming to guide relevant legal processes were introduced, including:

• the American Law Institute’s (ALI) “ Principles Governing Jurisdiction, Choice of Law, and Judgments in Intellectual Property in Transnational Disputes” (2008);
• the European Max Planck Group’s “ Principles on Conflict of Laws in Intellectual Property (CLIP)” (2011);
• the “Transparency Proposal on Jurisdiction, Choice of Law, Recognition and Enforcement for Foreign Judgments in Intellectual Property” (2009);
• the “Joint Proposal on the Principles of Private International Law on Intellectual Property Rights”, drafted by members of the Private International Law Association of Korea and Japan (2010); and
• the ongoing work of the  ILA Intellectual Property and Private International Law Committee to develop guidelines on IP and private international law.