Dr Henning Grosse Ruse-Khan speaks on Economic Development and Intellectual Property at the World Intellectual Property Organization's (WIPO) conference on Intellectual Property and Development held in Geneva, Switzerland on April 7th and 8th, 2016
Henning’s presentation discussed the development of utility model protection in Germany as an example for a ‘responsive’ IP system that has developed significantly over time. In Germany, the rationale for introducing a system for protecting new and improved working tools as well as other utilitarian objects in 1891 was closely tied to a perceived gap of protection that resulted from high thresholds for obtaining patent protection, and the absence of design protection for improved technical or otherwise functional elements of a product. Henning argued that how the German utility model system developed over a period of more than 100 years supports the general principle that, for an IP system to ‘work’, it needs to be responsive to the changing needs of its ‘users’ (understood widely to cover not only right holders, but competitors, consumers, other third parties and the general public). This reinforces the need for policy space to (re-)design national IP systems – while of course also taking into account reasonable demands for harmonisation of IP standards in a globalised economy.
For further information: http://www.wipo.int/meetings/en/2016/ip_development_conference.html
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