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The World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO), a U.N. agency specializing in intellectual property protection, will pick a new head this week. China now heads up four of the 15 U.N. specialized agencies — the International Civil Aviation Organization, the International Telecommunication Union, the Food and Agriculture Organization, and the U.N. Industrial Development Organization. Beijing is running a campaign to lead WIPO — despite U.S. and E.U. concerns about China’s lack of protection for intellectual property rights. China is also a huge user of the global intellectual property system, filing almost half of global patent applications in 2018. Research shows how China is no longer a passive side-player within multilateral institutions. Indeed, analysts point out that China is increasingly keen to pursue its interests within traditionally Western-led multilateral institutions such as the United Nations. China’s growing economic might, strategic reach and foreign policy ambitions help drive Beijing’s increasingly active participation within the multilateral system. ADVERTISING Why worry about China’s leadership at the U.N.? 🏛️ Follow Politics Follow What’s the big concern? Analysts worry that Chinese international civil servants heading up these multilateral organizations will promote China’s national interests, rather than strengthen liberal values like accountability, equality and transparency. Wu Hongbo, former undersecretary general for the U.N. Department of Economic and Social Affairs, said that “as a [People’s Republic of China] international civil servant, when it comes to Chinese national sovereignty and security, we will undoubtedly defend our country’s interests.” Is China’s influence at the United Nations all it’s cracked up to be? Other reports note China uses its U.N. leadership roles to block activists from participating in human rights forums — refusing to allow civil society members to join U.N. discussions if they offer views critical of the Chinese government. China has many levers of influence China’s growing economic stature translates into more resources for bargaining and coercion — and here’s how Beijing is using those levers: Last year, China forgave Cameroon’s debt the month before the small African nation withdrew its candidate to head the Food and Agriculture Organization. According to U.S. officials, China also threatened to cut off key exports from Argentina, Brazil and Uruguay if those countries did not back Qu Dongyu, Beijing’s FAO candidate. China is now reportedly using investment and job opportunities as incentives for votes for its WIPO candidate. China also uses its resources strategically to set the agenda for multilateral engagement. For example, China is the sole contributor to the U.N. Peace and Development Trust Fund, which gives Chinese officials four of the five steering committee seats. This committee advises the U.N. secretary general on which projects to fund — allowing Beijing to promote its Belt and Road projects. It’s an uncommon, but not altogether new, approach. Japan, for instance, also established the Trust Fund for Human Security to support projects aiming at removing pervasive threats to human lives. But that fund is advised by members of various nationalities and backgrounds. The Chinese approach seems to be working — Belt and Road goals are getting a lot of attention throughout U.N. agencies. UNICEF praised the initiative’s capacity to “multiply our impact” in fighting child poverty, while the U.N. high commissioner for Refugees applauded the Belt and Road’s emphasis on connectivity. Those comments suggest that having key people working within the U.N. system helps China advance its own interests as synonymous with global interests. Beijing is counting on its massive Belt and Road Initiative. But are Chinese firms on board? China has another target: Taiwan China uses the U.N. system to exclude Taiwan globally as an independent player. In January, the International Civil Aviation Organization blocked the Twitter accounts of scholars, policy analysts and congressional staffers who asked whether the ICAO would include Taiwan in covid-19 planning and logistics. Though Taipei is a significant aviation hub, China has not requested Taiwan’s participation in recent ICAO assembly meetings. But it is important to remember that China’s influence in the U.N. system isn’t monolithic, and China does not automatically achieve all of its foreign policy objectives. For example, in 2019, China nominated ex-Hong Kong police chief Andy Tsang Wai-hung to lead the U.N. Office on Drugs and Crime, at the equivalent rank of undersecretary general. Instead, U.N. Secretary General António Guterres appointed Ghada Fathi Waly of Egypt. And U.N. Security Council members have begun pushing back on the inclusion of the words “Belt and Road Initiative” in U.N. resolutions, pressing China’s diplomats to clarify or drop their preferred terminology. What does the U.S. say? The U.S. government has taken a strong stance at times, warning FAO representatives in June that China-led specialized agencies “demonstrated a bias towards Chinese foreign policy and a lack of transparency and accountability.” The United States recently created a special envoy for multilateral integrity within the State Department’s Bureau of International Organization Affairs — a role that will focus on “countering the malign influences of the PRC and others in the U.N. system.” The United States is reportedly running a diplomatic campaign to see its preferred candidate elected to head WIPO. Is China a strategic partner or rival power? But the U.S. special envoy may have difficulty countering China’s growing influence, particularly given the backsliding of U.S. priorities and policies toward multilateral institutions. To work effectively, the special envoy will rely on support from within the State Department. State is still missing key appointments, with the Bureau of International Organization Affairs in particular depleted by weak morale, staff departures and inability to recruit personnel, and by hostile treatment of career diplomats. The United States has its own image problems within the multilateral system, including late payments and arrears in its U.N. contributions. The Trump administration also proposed cutting U.S. contributions to the World Health Organization in half. But the United States currently makes zero budget contributions to a range of U.N. agencies, from the Palestinian-focused U.N. Relief and Works Agency to the U.N. Population Fund. And the United States withdrew from the U.N. Human Rights Council and the U.N. Economic and Social Council. Without the U.S. strategic commitment or U.S. resources for the multilateral system, China may continue to find ways to fill the financial and manpower leadership roles the United States seems to be abandoning.

The second vulnerability that must be prioritized is economic. As of writing (February 2016), economies the world over are going through serious challenges. Decision-makers must create a more stable global market system that provides development and human security for all. Economic development (discussed in the final part of this chapter) will allow states and decision-makers the ability to become more resilient to other threats. Economic development is thus the second most important vulnerability to prioritize because it instigates the best use of resources. By using resources efficiently, states can amass capabilities to neutralize other sources of vulnerability such as health, military and political. To stem economic vulnerability requires some protection from capitalism’s inherent flux: the cycles of boom and bust. The economy must be made to serve the community; it must be able to serve the needs of society and therefore must be re-embedded: Our thesis is the idea of a self-adjusting market implied a stark utopia. Such an institution could not exist for any length of time without annihilating the human and natural substance of society; it would have physically destroyed man and transformed his surroundings into a wilderness. Inevitably, society took measures to protect itself, but whatever measures it took impaired the self-regulation of the market, disorganized industrial life, and thus endangered society in yet another way. (Polanyi 2001, 4) More regulation is therefore needed to ensure the stability of world society, not just in terms of political stability but in environmental and other areas too. Allowing a totally liberal world economy is too risky given the known costs. Proper mechanisms must be put into place to ensure sustainable growth rates to build resilience to systemic vulnerability and its reach or distribution across states. Decision-makers must see this as important but certain industries continue to fight for deregulation. These industries are too greedy to be allowed into political discourse as they pervert the minds of decision-makers (Stiglitz 2013). Greed works in the short term but it is ultimately short sighted: in the long run we are all dead after all. The other vulnerabilities are serious but are on their way to being stable. States understand the power of Ebola, Zika and cyber-security, for instance, to destroy the world. States are well down the road to developing infrastructure to absorb the chaos that can result from proliferation of such issues. This is because decision-makers fully grasp the importance of establishing control over epidemics and cyber-insecurity. Cyber-defensive measures are being bolstered and increasing power is being given to institutions and regimes to help fight and neutralize outbreaks. More can be done but I am hopeful society is moving in the right direction here. Health invulnerability has a great deal to do with mental health. Many terrorist movements take advantage of people who are clinically depressed due to their being ostracized from society. Mental health issues are part of overall health and must be treated like any other disease. For this to occur, certain stigma must disappear in favor of treatment. In this way, environment and health protection can reduce recruitment to malicious organizations through prevention. Military vulnerabilities coming from states and political vulnerabilities such as terrorist networks are the lowest priority. Strategies already exist to deal with these problems. We have established that containment is the best form of engagement for both issues. If decision-makers perceive this as a viable option, then all that is missing is the will to implement the strategy. States such as China, Russia and the USA position themselves aggressively; but war has not broken out yet because of diplomatic channels, as well as the presence of nuclear weapons that deter aggression. Containment allows for a degree of understanding and freedom of state autonomy if certain lines are not crossed. As a consequence, state conflict is not a high priority at this juncture. The same goes for violent political networks. These do not pose a serious challenge to any hegemonic state and are contained in specific areas of the world. Once we cut off access to wealth, then groups like Islamic State are sure to fizzle out eventually if left alone to their own violent devices. The ranked order of vulnerabilities necessitates a fundamental shift of priorities, especially in the realm of health and humanitarian focus. It will need serious cooperation at the global level. States must be made to work together on these matters. This is, therefore, a responsibility for great powers and hegemonic actors, those who possess enough power to create and defend the system. These systems-creative actors (see Chap. 2) must guide this prioritization process by leading the world against systems-destructive forces described. The capabilities of great powers must be used to solve systemic vulnerabilities. These interactions guide state behavior and are the defining principle of any systemic theory of international politics. Given the multiplicity of systemic vulnerabilities and their distribution across units, states must further link respective resources. The more resources available and in use, the more effectively states can solve problems. The use of securitization and prioritization discourse is essential to achieve this goal. It is here that we see the application of the reprioritization process with regards to systemic vulnerabilities. Such action is a product of the securitization/desecuritization process of prioritization as vulnerabilities are perceived as threatening to human survival. Decision-makers must not look at one source of vulnerability, but must rather take a structural approach to determine the most efficient way to deal with the wide array of problems that undermine survival. Hence, to recover well during times of systemic crisis, whether financial, the result of the rapid influx of refugees or after natural disasters, is essential in dealing with sudden and rapid systemic shocks. States that cannot deal with these on their own are considered weak and vulnerable. Great powers are those that are economically developed with the resilience necessary to adapt quickly to any event. The root of success in neutralizing systemic vulnerability is through systems-creation, that is, the formation of an international system that supports economic development. Economic development allows for the efficient use of scarce resources and is the key to resilience given systemic vulnerability. It allows a state the flexibility to absorb and defuse external shocks in all forms: economic, political, environmental and so forth. Henry Bruton’s modernist definition of economic development understands states to be economically developed if they are sufficiently flexible and diverse to adjust to change (Bruton 1965, 1). Development designates any increase in gross domestic product (GDP) that is sustainable, multidimensional and durable enough to endure economic shocks. Undeveloped countries may suffer from productivity discrepancies due to sudden shock. For example, an undeveloped country would be a monocultural economy dependent on one or two sources of wealth. Rapid fluctuations in commodity prices may send the country into macroeconomic chaos. A developed economy must be able to produce prosperity for the population given potential instability. Conversely, an underdeveloped state is “low income … predominantly a primary producing and consuming area … production is food grains and fibers, although in several countries mining is an activity of importance” (ibid., 88). Underdeveloped economies, then, possess vulnerabilities. Bruton notes this: “The rich country seems to have an economy that has growth built into it, while the poor country seems to have an economy in which ‘nongrowth’ is built into it” (ibid., 2–3). Development specifically deals with eradicating systemic issues that hamper growth (ibid., 3). Accordingly therefore, “economic development presents a means to weather exogenous and endogenous economic, environmental, political and social shocks endemic to vulnerable states … there is a clear dichotomy between these two concepts, vulnerability and development” (Kassab 2014, 66). Economic development improves the resilience of states to recover from systemic shock. It allows for best use of resources to counter threats and allows for the provision of human security, an important concept to stem the proliferation of violent political movements. Other vulnerabilities, such as health, cyber, environmental, can also be dealt with given available resources. In the event of war, a developed state could very well outlast a lesser developed, revisionist state. Hence, economic sustainability is the root of any state’s success in the face of systemic vulnerability.

By the end of 2022 SARS-CoV-2 had infected most of humankind and directly or indirectly killed perhaps 20 million people – an effective global fatality rate of 0.25% inclusive of reinfections.8 Many viruses are far more lethal. Variola major, the causative agent of smallpox, killed approximately 30% of patients while maintaining high transmissibility (estimated R0=3.5-6);9 the virus was responsible for the deaths of 500 million people in the century before its eradication.10 The 1971 Aralsk outbreak, which involved a potentially weaponised strain, was transmitted by vaccinated individuals and exhibited 100% lethality in the three unvaccinated patients.11 More devastating pathogens exist in other animals that live in tight-knit groups: rabbit haemorrhagic disease virus (RHDV) is highly contagious, transmitted asymptomatically in young animals, and 80-100% lethal in adults.12 If such a virus were to sweep the world anywhere near as quickly as the Omicron variant of SARS-CoV-2, billions would perish.

Even at the height of the Cold War, a city-targeting nuclear exchange would not have seriously threatened the viability of most nations in the southern hemisphere.13 Given humankind’s demonstrated failure to reliably contain the moderately transmissible SARS-CoV-2 virus and the dearth of large-scale subsequent investments aimed at halting pandemic transmission by any government, a sufficiently severe pandemic-class agent would threaten the stability of every unprepared nation. Today, this includes every country in the world. Thankfully, most of the technologies required to mount a reliable defence already exist. With dedicated preparations, many nations could become highly resistant to catastrophic pandemics – but only if they anticipate more severe threats than a reprise of COVID-19.

There’s a clamor around the world to return to the pre-pandemic “normal.” In reality, though, a reset to the fall of 2019 is out of the question. Leaders at all levels, all around the globe, must apply the painful lessons learned these past three years. And that means fundamentally shifting the world’s approach to many aspects of health security. One good place to start: Rethinking the paradigm for global scientific cooperation. The scientific and political elite have long assumed that the Global North is the best place to develop solutions for challenges in Africa, South Asia, and Latin America. Top-down biases have generally blinded high-income countries to the enormous reserves of talent and ideas in low- and middle-income nations. Time and again, pioneers in the Global South have made crucial scientific discoveries, ranging from breakthrough research on Burkitt lymphoma to groundbreaking work on HIV treatment and prevention to the first sequencing of the Omicron variant, yet their contributions are often discounted. The worlds of science and public health can no longer afford this arrogance. People in the Global North must stop ignoring, marginalizing, and patronizing the Global South. In an era of global challenges, respectful, balanced global collaborations matter. It is essential that high-income nations accelerate building scientific infrastructure and capacity in low- and middle-income nations while also embracing the big thinking and bold innovation that exists within them. Fortunately, there is movement in this direction. We have both spent considerable time working and supporting work in Africa, where we have seen multiple encouraging examples that we hope can emerge as models for engagement across the entire Global South. Among them: To change “aid to Africa” to “made in Africa,” David Moinina Sengeh, the minister and chief innovation officer for Sierra Leone’s Directorate of Science, Technology, and Innovation, launched Global Minimum Inc. in collaboration with the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. With diverse financial support from corporations such as IBM and philanthropies such as the Lemelson Foundation, this nongovernmental organization fuels entrepreneurship programs in Sierra Leone, Kenya, and South Africa. To turn African universities into R&D hubs, the Africa Union and Africa Centres for Disease Control and Prevention launched the Partnerships for African Vaccine Manufacturing, which aims to ensure that at least 60% of the routine immunizations needed in Africa are made on the continent by 2040. To support that initiative, institutions including the U.S. International Development Finance Corporation, the European Investment Bank, and the French Development Agency have invested in the Institut Pasteur de Dakar, a manufacturer in Senegal, to dramatically expand its capacity to make vaccines for Covid-19 and other devastating diseases, such as yellow fever. Skeptics sometimes raise the specter of “brain drain,” arguing that there’s little point in training scientists and clinicians in the Global South if they’re just going to head elsewhere to pursue careers in wealthier nations. This is a tired trope. Yes, some trainees and established scientists will leave for good. Others will spend time abroad and then return home with exciting new ideas. And many will stay right where they are in Africa, South Asia, or Latin America, committed to building scientific capacity at home. Indeed, they may be more experienced than peers in wealthy countries in developing pragmatic solutions to address threats like climate change and infectious disease, though their contributions — which are often extremely valuable to their home countries — aren’t always appropriately valued by scientists in the Global North. Whether researchers in the Global South stay at home or migrate abroad, the key point is that everyone benefits from unlocking their potential. These programs don’t promote brain drain. They promote a global “wisdom gain.” There is perhaps no better recent example of successful capacity building in the Global South than the Botswana-Harvard AIDS Institute Partnership, the first lab to identify the Omicron variant and alert the world to its existence. Established in 1996, this NIH-funded lab has about 350 full-time employees, with local researchers taking the lead in researching and treating AIDS in Africa. When the Covid-19 pandemic struck, the lab pivoted to genomic surveillance within two weeks. As it turned out, the team’s excellence provided an early warning to prepare for the next stage in the pandemic. Related: Fighting Covid-19 in Kibera, one of Africa’s largest informal settlements Such scientific excellence is not isolated. Major developments in HIV prevention, treatment, and vaccine development have come from scientists who got their start in the U.S. National Institutes of Health’s AIDS International Training and Research Program (AITRP), which was established in Africa in 1988 and later merged with the Fogarty HIV Research Training Program. It trained 2,000 physicians and scientists at the forefront of public health in 100 low- and middle-countries. Research by AITRP trainees, for instance, uncovered how HIV and co-infections interface, leading to earlier screening and treatment for tuberculosis and cervical cancer. As these examples demonstrate, institutions in the Global South are not starting from zero — not by a long shot. Targeted investments have improved infrastructure. Health crises such as Ebola and Zika have also spurred major leaps in R&D and clinical capacity. It was after the Ebola outbreak of 2014-16 that the Africa CDC took off, and multilateral partners such as the World Bank invested in the Regional Disease Surveillance Project covering 16 countries in Africa. Now is the time to accelerate that work by bringing together the private, public, and academic sectors to invest more aggressively in training talent and scaling infrastructure across Africa, South Asia, and Latin America. To be clear, nations in the Global South also need to step up their own investments, as Christian T. Happi, director of the African Centre of Excellence for Genomics of Infectious Diseases, and John N. Nkengasong, director of the Africa CDC, pointed out in a recent article in Nature. Twenty years ago, countries across Africa pledged to dedicate at least 15% of their annual budgets to the health sector, and high-income countries pledged to allocate 0.7% of their gross national incomes to international aid. Both pledges have fallen woefully short. Today, no nation in Africa spends more than 2% of its gross domestic product on health and very few high-income countries are close to their 0.7% targets. That needs to change. The scientific and public health communities cannot rely solely on government spending to drive innovation, however. Jeremy Farrar, director of the Wellcome charitable foundation, eloquently highlighted the role of philanthropy in a recent interview, calling it a “catalytic disruptor” that takes risks the commercial sector and governments won’t take. Academia can be another such catalyst. That’s why we believe private-public-academic partnerships are so essential. It will take all sectors, working together, to activate the full power and potential of scientific talent worldwide. Covid-19 is just the latest threat to make clear that global health challenges require global solutions. The world must rise to the occasion.

New York, 10 January 2022 – The World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) has joined the UN Sustainable Development Group – gathering all UN entities working to advance the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) by 2030 – to boost innovation, technology exchange and creativity in addressing some of the most pressing needs of developing countries. These range from urgently closing the COVID-19 global vaccination gap to boosting women and youth entrepreneurship to tackling the existential threat of climate change. WIPO is the UN specialized agency that leads the development of a balanced and effective international intellectual property (IP) system that enables innovation and creativity for the benefit of all. WIPO runs the worldwide IP networks used by individuals and enterprises around the world to grow their business activities, supporting job growth and national development. WIPO's addition to the UNSDG will bolster UN teams’ capacity to deliver tailored on-the-ground support to 162 countries and territories. It will expand access to a range of services offered by WIPO, including knowledge and capacity building services to leverage creativity, technology and innovation to better equip countries in tackling global challenges. “Innovation and technology transfer will catalyze a swifter and greener recovery from the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic that leaves no one behind. Expertise from WIPO will add much value to the efforts of our UN teams on the ground as they support countries in unleashing their sustainable development potential. We welcome the skillsets WIPO will bring to our UN country teams,” said UNSDG chair, United Nations Deputy-Secretary-General Amina J. Mohammed. “This new form of strategic collaboration that draws on the entire UN family’s collective commitment to achieve the Sustainable Development Goals will help WIPO accelerate and scale its services and initiatives supporting countries as they leverage innovation and creativity to tackle global challenges, like the COVID-19 pandemic and climate change," said WIPO Director General Daren Tang. Boosting innovation to leave no one behind Accelerating progress to achieve the SDGs is increasingly reliant on IP-driven technology and innovation. The IP system sets an incentive structure for people to create and innovate solutions to improve the lives of all. It is from this perspective that WIPO also supports the development of innovation ecosystems and promotes the use of IP tools such as patents, trademarks, copyright and designs as assets for economic growth, job creation and social welfare. To help countries tackle COVID-19, WIPO has recently enhanced partnerships with other UNSDG members, including the World Health Organization, as well as other international organizations like the World Trade Organization. This enhances the flow of information and strengthens countries’ capacity to address the pandemic. WIPO's COVID-19 support to its Member States comprises five main areas: policy and legislative assistance; technical assistance and capacity building; innovation support and technology transfer; IP dispute resolution; and knowledge resources. In an example of the kind of IP-backed enterprise growth supported by WIPO, a woman entrepreneur in Uganda is building an Africa-based detergent brand to help fight against the COVID-19 pandemic. WIPO’s new role in the UNSDG will be crucial to scale up such initiatives that help advance the SDGs, creating jobs, promoting women empowerment and healthy lifestyles, while boosting countries' competitiveness in the global market.

From this, policymakers need to elevate innovation policy on the global stage to a similar level as trade when it comes to debates about how to optimize global economic growth and welfare. Most policymakers, economists, and pundits are well versed in the mantra that free trade boosts global economic welfare. But that same intellectual consensus does not exist when it comes to supporting innovation policies, such as robust intellectual property protections, that are key to maximizing global innovation. And while an increasing number of policymakers realize that innovation is central to economic growth and improved standards of living, many have not connected domestic and global approaches in the same way other policies are assessed from a trade perspective (i.e., as either protectionist or open to trade). This focus on the components that support innovation, especially intellectual property, would be a new lens through which to advance international economic and trade policy.

Policymakers need to elevate innovation policy on the global stage to a similar level as trade when it comes to debates about how to optimize global economic growth and welfare.

IP rights have come under attack from a loose coalition of academics, nongovernmental organizations, multilateral groups, and others whose opposition threatens to undermine innovation, growth, and progress on key global challenges.

IP opponents make specious arguments to falsely portray IP as a tool to benefit large corporations and developed countries at the expense of human freedom, the diffusion of ideas, and growth in developing countries.

Our delegation participated in numerous bilateral meetings with other intellectual property (IP) offices to improve IP systems globally. We are making it easier for U.S. businesses to compete through stronger IP protection and reduced barriers to global protection.

While in Geneva, we formed new partnerships with WIPO to advance the development of green technologies and to support work in the standard-setting area. In support of the Biden Administration's actions to address the clear and present danger of climate change, the USPTO entered into a partnership with WIPO GREEN. This global online platform facilitates the dissemination and advancement of environmentally friendly technologies, provides opportunities for collaboration and partnership, and encourages widespread adoption.

The World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO), the “Major League Baseball Commission” of intellectual property (IP), including patents, trademarks, and industrial designs, is an underappreciated but very influential multilateral institution. WIPO gives international recognition to the property rights in IP and serves as the linchpin in the monetization of IP. A key part of WIPO is the Patent Cooperation Treaty (PCT). The PCT provides for the international recognition of patent rights by all treaty members. However, like in a national patent, the secrecy of that information during examination is essential, or its monetary value is destroyed. As the role of IP continues to grow in international trade, WIPO will play an increasingly important role. As WIPO prepares to have a turnover in leadership, how it conducts itself, and how it protects business-sensitive information will be not only mission-critical but also critical for U.S. national interests. Therefore, now is the time for the United States to develop a strategy to ensure the best candidate for director general is elected.

Q1: What is WIPO?

In Australia, as in many other jurisdictions, AI-generated works and inventions are unlikely to be protected by patent law and copyright law because of the absence of a human inventor or author – which is a necessary requirement in order to qualify for protection as an intellectual property right (IP).

In light of this context, the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO), the specialised agency of the United Nations which heads the development of global IP systems,  has been leading an initiative to identify policy issues relevant to the regulation of intellectual property rights related to AI.

In September 2019, the World Intellectual Property Organisation (WIPO) launched a much-needed conversation on IP and AI, and consulted with member state representatives on the potential impact of AI on IP. Over the course of the consultation, WIPO received more than 250 responses from a wide range of global stakeholders.

The fruit of its labour was published on 21 May 2020 and can be found here. The ‘Revised Issues Paper on Intellectual Property Policy and Artificial Intelligence’ amends WIPO’s previously issued ‘Draft Issues Paper on Intellectual Property Policy and Artificial Intelligence’ (found here) (Issues Paper).

From 7 to 9 July 2020, WIPO (the World Intellectual Property Office) held a three-day convention with interested stakeholders around the world, to discuss how the intellectual property (IP) community should address the development of artificial intelligence (AI), its impact on various aspects of IP law and policy, and whether new IP laws or guidelines are required. Over 2,000 people from 130 countries, including representatives of member states, academic, scientific and private organisations joined the meetings. The discussions involved contributions from more than 50 speakers, including presentations from senior members of the German and US judiciary (eg Judge Klaus Grabinski and Judge Kathleen O’Malley), interventions from representatives from member state IP offices (eg the UKIPO, EPO and USPTO), industry organisations (eg the International Chamber of Commerce (ICC), International Federation of Library Associations (IFLA) and Creative Commons) and industry (eg IBM and Tata Consultancy Services).

WIPO Conversations on artificial intelligence

WASHINGTON — The United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) and the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) today agreed to undertake joint efforts to facilitate the resolution of disputes related to standard essential patents.

Standard essential patents, or SEPs, are patents that have been declared essential to a given technical standard. As part of the standards-setting process, patent owners may agree to license SEPs on fair, reasonable, and nondiscriminatory (FRAND) terms. Standards touch all aspects of modern life and include video compression, wireless communication technologies, computer connection standards, automotive technology, and more.

You can file trade marks in over 100 countries via the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) on one application.

Trade mark target

In recent years, the process of international copyright lawmaking has become quite different from that which gave birth to the Berne Convention.' If asked to identify the moment at which the international process changed, most commentators might highlight the Agreement on Trade Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS)2 as an era-defining event. 3 And, to be sure, TRIPS did radically change the institutional structure of the international intellectual property system as well as some of the assumptions underlying the system.4 But I would like to suggest that the WIPO Copyright Treaty (or WCT)5 also represented a watershed moment in international copyright law. Critical analysis of the debates leading up to and during the conclusion of that treaty in 1996 highlights a number of the challenges that we need to confront in shaping the future of international copyright lawmaking.

The WIPO Copyright Treaty radically changed the international copyright lawmaking environment for two reasons. First, it was in the 1996 Diplomatic Conference that one begins to see the most widespread explicit discussion of the concept of "balance" being integral to international instruments. Indeed, this led to recognition of that concept in the preamble to the treaty. Of course, the importance of balance in the international copyright system had been discussed before 1996. For example, the Stockholm revision of the Berne Convention in 1967 clearly sought to reflect a new balance that more explicitly recognized the concerns of developing countries about access to copyrighted works.6 But the rhetoric or language of balance came to the forefront in 1996 with the WIPO Copyright Treaty, and this rhetoric increasingly frames the current debate.

The WIPO Copyright Treaty (WCT) is an agreement which originated from the Berne Convention. It was developed to protect the works and rights of their authors in the digital environment. The WCT mentions two subject matters to be protected by copyright: a) computer programs and b) databases. WCT was adopted by the member states of the WIPO in 1996. It provided additional levels of copyright protection in response to advances in information technology, improving upon previous copyright treaties.

The Berne Convention

Thus with the age of globalization, proposals to further harmonize domestic patent laws at the international level have understandably attracted considerable attention. International patent harmonization originally meant the creation of uniform patent laws throughout the world. Even though patents have always been national, such a system was efficiently-sized at a time when economies were relatively closed and technology diffused slowly. Today, inventors can expect many of their inventions to be immediately usable throughout the world. As the number of countries for which an inventor seeks a patent increases, the costs of national filings and determinations rises proportionately. So also the inadequate patent protection in external markets leads to a loss in economic rent to the inventor especially in a global economy that has an unharmonized patent protection - the incentives to inventors may definitely be diminished. This could be demoralizing knowing that one's invention is inadequately protected from being copied.

The majority of the international patent community is and has been supportive of the idea of uniformity, recognizing the value of creating a uniform patent law on a global scale with all of its attendant benefits to be accrued. This has led to the European Parliament adopting a uniform patent system for Europe. If the plan goes into effect as expected by early 2014, it would try to remedy the country-by-country approach whose time and costs have long been an impediment to innovation across the European Union.

For many developing countries, the promise of innovation-fueled economic growth remains unfulfilled. Even with well-established intellectual property systems in place, few local innovators benefit. Instead, patent grants to foreigners far outnumber those to local applicants, despite a strong local innovative culture.

Patents drive value creation for individual inventors and small enterprises that can help these countries grow. They attract investment. And they provide protection when small firms need to collaborate with third parties to implement their vision. Without access to patents, innovators find themselves at palpable disadvantage in the market. When these inventors cannot compete, we are all deprived of their innovation.

Although the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) is a technical intergovernmental organization with a limited mandate, it has been entrusted with a panoply of tasks. These include, inter alia, the international harmonization of intellectual property law, the administration of fee-based global intellectual property protection services, and the delivery of dispute resolution services to individuals. While the central role of WIPO in the continuous development of substantive intellectual property law has been questioned by developing countries, the administrative activities of WIPO have remained largely unscathed by critique and, therefore, have not attracted much attention. They revolve around the international filing, registration or recognition of industrial property rights, such as patents, industrial designs and trademarks, and provide an interesting perspective on the law of international institutions.

Ongoing public consultations from the World Intellectual Property Organisation (“WIPO”) and the UK Information Commissioner’s Office demonstrate a focus by intellectual property (“IP”) policymakers on better understanding issues posed by artificial intelligence (“AI”). In this alert we outline some key issues in relation to copyright ownership in AI-generated works and inventorship and ownership challenges for patent protection in AI-generated inventions.

What is AI?