What happens when entities such as ABPI and WIPO (World Intellectual Property Organization) join forces for joint action? “Our goal is to spread the culture of intellectual property through cutting-edge events in this area”, replies José Graça Aranha, the regional director of WIPO in Brazil. Goal achieved. From the face-to-face summer courses, started in 2018, to the virtual format of IP Meetings, the partnership between the two entities brought the topic up for debate with diverse audiences, including lawyers, law students, executive and judicial authorities. Recently, ABPI and WIPO signed an agreement to use out-of-court mechanisms to solve IP disputes. “Cooperation seeks to promote debate and keep the flame of Intellectual Property up to date”, adds Graça Aranha.
IP Meetings reaches its seventh edition certified by an audience that accounts for more than 7 thousand hits so far. The event started in a virtual format in April of this year, with the celebration of the World Intellectual Property Day, with 2,200 views. “It is the way, in this pandemic situation, to keep the discussion up to date and enrich the debate, showing the different points of view of IP”, explains Graça Aranha.
The diversity of guests and themes has marked virtual events. IP Meetings debaters include judges, entrepreneurs, executive officials, and other experts. The debates have already covered, among others, topics such as the Marrakesh Treaty, which aims to ease up access to printed works for the visually impaired; mediation and arbitration in IP, copyright and memes; Industry 4.0; registration of computer programs and trademark registration.
The cooperation between the two entities, which dates back to the 1970s, has recently gained new impetus with the WIPO Summer Courses, signed in 2018 by Graça Aranha and the president of ABPI, Luiz Edgard Montaury Pimenta. The courses are part of an ongoing program developed by the WIPO Academy of IP training for young professionals and students, lasting two weeks. In Brazil, three editions of the course have already been held in 2018 and 2019. Over the next two years, WIPO, the BPTO and ABPI will offer four course-sessions, two in Rio de Janeiro and two in other capitals to be defined.
