WIPO Symposium to Address Operational Deficiencies in Global IP Systems

Geneva, August 28, 2009
MA/2009/50

An international symposium in Geneva on September 17 and 18, 2009 will address the need to improve the interface between national intellectual property (IP) systems to overcome operational inefficiencies arising largely from growing demand for IP rights. The event will foster public-private dialogue and aims to strengthen ties between IP service providers (national IP authorities) and their clients (industry), to highlight the concerns of the user community and the need to re-engineer IP systems to reduce bottlenecks which are slowing the pace of innovation that is key to economic growth.

IP systems need to keep pace with globalizing trends in innovation and business practices. The Symposium offers stakeholders an opportunity to explore how existing highly diverse national and regional IP infrastructures can be developed to support the dynamics of innovation which is increasingly transnational and borderless.

The first Global Symposium for Intellectual Property Authorities, which is open to the general public, will contribute to a better understanding of the complex challenges facing IP offices in the delivery of their services, help map possible pathways to ensure the coherent development of global IP infrastructure and foster closer links between and among national IP offices. IP infrastructure is essentially the underlying framework of knowledge that supports innovation. It relates not just to hardware, (e.g. computers) but to the application and configuration of knowledge to promote best practices that support innovation and strengthen national IP capacity.

A new WIPO strategic goal seeks to create a more robust and coherent global IP infrastructure by supporting efforts to upgrade technical capabilities of offices and by fostering greater collaboration and more focused coordination of activities by IP offices. There is great scope to facilitate the flow of technological information by, for example, upgrading databases and introducing best practices into the operations of IP offices to ensure that the system keeps pace in practical terms with the evolving needs of the user community.