About Us
Mission — Staff — Governance — Contact
Intellectual Property Watch, a non-profit independent news service, reports on the interests and behind-the-scenes dynamics that influence the design and implementation of international intellectual property policies.
Reporting Services
Intellectual Property Watch’s reporting is available in two formats:
- Online: news stories and features are regularly posted in a dynamic weblog format and archived on the Intellectual Property Watch website. Readers can keep up-to-date via email notifications or RSS feed.
- Print: a 16-page monthly edition includes a selection of news stories, features, briefs and news about people in the IP community. Printed in hard copy, the monthly is distributed worldwide by mail to subscribers and is available online with a searchable archive. Additional special stories and documents also are available online only for subscribers. A trial subscription is available. Readers can register for an email notification of the availability of the online version of the Monthly Reporter and other subscriber-only stories and documents.
Funding
Intellectual Property Watch is funded through subscriptions and by grants from private philanthropic foundations. Intellectual Property Watch currently has funding from the Ford Foundation, the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation, the Organisation Internationale de la Francophonie. and the Loterie Romande. Past funding was provided by the Rockefeller Foundation and the Open Society Institute.
Intellectual Property Watch does not accept financial support from anonymous donors or from private corporations (except in the form of subscriptions to our reporting services).
Freelance Writers and Advisers
To conduct its reporting activities, Intellectual Property Watch is forging partnerships with a network of contributing journalists, particularly at the regional level. For more information, contact info [at] ip-watch [dot] ch.
Intellectual Property Watch also benefits from the advice and support of an informal council of advisers comprised of leading international authorities on intellectual property, sustainable development, science and technology, and transparency and accountability in global governance.
Editor-in-Chief / Director: Mr William New (wnew [at] ip-watch [dot] ch)
William New has been on the reporting forefront of most major international intellectual property policy developments in the past decade. William joined Intellectual Property Watch as Editor-in-Chief in January 2005, with primary responsibility for the writing, editing, publishing, management, and finances of the organisation. Prior to that, he spent nearly five years as a senior writer and editor for the National Journal Group in Washington, and three years as a senior reporter at Washington-based Inside U.S. Trade and managing editor of Americas Trade.
During that time, William covered developments at United Nations bodies such as the World Intellectual Property Organization, International Telecommunication Union, and the UN Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD) as well as the World Trade Organization, Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, Hague Conference on Private International Law, and Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers. Coverage also included regional bodies such as the European Union, Council of Europe, Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation forum, Association of Southeast Asian Nations, the Southern Cone Common Market (Mercosur), and the Organization of American States. William has closely reported on the activities of the US Congress and key US administration agencies such as the Office of the US Trade Representative, the Commerce Department, Patent and Trademark Office, Copyright Office, State Department, and the White House.
While at National Journal, he worked briefly as an editor for a former National Journal project, UN Wire, an online publication on the United Nations.
William’s coverage has focused on global intellectual property concerns in areas such as international trade and the promulgation and enforcement of copyright, patent and trademark laws and agreements. He has tracked free-trade negotiations at the bilateral, regional and multilateral levels, including North American and European bilateral deals, the Free Trade Area of the Americas and World Trade Organization negotiations. At the WTO, issues also included enforcement and updating of the Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPs), geographical indications, pharmaceuticals, China’s accession, and dispute settlement cases.
William has also followed intellectual property issues in the context of debates on information and communications technology including global Internet governance, open source, digital rights management, and Internet domain names. His coverage of science issues has spanned research and development, nanotechnology, biotechnology, and open standards.
William is an accredited journalist at the World Trade Organization and the United Nations in Geneva, and a member of the Swiss press association Impressum, the Association of Correspondents Accredited to the United Nations (ACANU), and the Club de la Presse Suisse.
Earlier in his career, William was at the Georgetown University School of Foreign Service, where he managed a North American Free Trade Agreement partnership programme between Canada, Mexico and the United States, and conducted outreach and marketing for the Center for Latin American Studies. Expert appearances on television and radio include CNBC, National Public Radio, and C-SPAN’s Washington Journal. William holds a Master’s degree in Latin American Economics and Political Science and an MBA in International Management from the University of New Mexico, as well as a BA in English from Oberlin College. He has non-native fluency in Spanish, some German and French.
Associate Editor: Ms Kaitlin Mara (kmara [at] ip-watch [dot] ch)
Kaitlin Mara joined IP Watch in January 2008. She reports and edits on all aspects of IP policy, with a particular emphasis on biodiversity, biotechnology, open source/open standards, trade and public health.
Kaitlin has an MSc in Environment and Development from the London School of Economics, where she wrote her dissertation on intellectual property legislation and access to agricultural biotechnology in developing countries. Her BA is in Political Science from Boston College, with a minor in Environmental Science. Prior to joining IPW, Kaitlin worked with the Consultative Group on International Agricultural Research (CGIAR) in Vientiane, Lao PDR.
She has a predilection for dark-brewed Costa Rican coffee and misses New York bagels.
She’s a native English speaker, and also speaks conversational French and very basic Lao.
Administrator / Staff Writer: Ms Catherine Saez (csaez [at] ip-watch [dot] ch)
Catherine Saez joined Intellectual Property Watch in June 2006. She is responsible for reporting and writing stories on a variety of topics and is in charge of office administration and the outreach programme.
Catherine has worked for the last ten years translating and copy editing publications, managing databases and providing administrative support for non-governmental organisations in the field of development and human rights. Before that, she worked in the industrial field as an executive secretary.
Catherine, a native of France, holds an administrative degree from the Ecole Nationale de Commerce in Paris as well as a certificate of Proficiency in English from Cambridge University. She also completed a small business management course at Scarlett Oaks Career Campus in Cincinnati.
She spent three years in the United States (Cincinnati) where she had the opportunity to improve her English, get involved in many community projects and travel extensively to discover many of the natural wonders of the land.
Catherine also is a press correspondent for a local newspaper where she can entertain both her taste for writing and human relationships.
Webmaster: Mr Olivier Tripet (webmaster [at] ip-watch [dot] ch)
The development and the maintenance of the Intellectual Property Watch website is handled by Olivier Tripet, an external consultant. Olivier has more than 10 years of experience in web development, business information systems and collaboration tools, as well as a strong business background in IT and telecommunications.
In 2004, Olivier founded b-spirit.com, providing corporate blogging solutions, as well as web consulting services tailored for small, medium and large companies.
Please visit b-spirit.com for further details.
Contributing Writers
To conduct its reporting activities, Intellectual Property Watch has forged partnerships with a network of contributing credentialed journalists, particularly at the regional level. Interested writers should contact William New at wnew [at] ip-watch [dot] ch.
Contributing Writers
- Tatum Anderson (UK)
- David Cronin (Belgium)
- Monika Ermert (Germany)
- Bruce Gain (France)
- Hepeng Jia (China)
- Claudia Jurberg (Brazil)
- Frederick Noronha (India)
- Liza Porteus Viana (US)
- Wagdy Sawahel (Egypt)
- Steven Seidenberg (US)
- Dugie Standeford (UK)
- Sinfah Tunsarawuth (Thailand)
- Nicholas Wadhams (Kenya)
Translators
Intellectual Property Watch has established a network of translators currently in French and Spanish. Some of our translators:
French:
- Vanja Guérin
- Griselda Jung
- Marisa Marolda
- Fanny Mourguet
- Line-Marie Notter
- Véronique Sauron
- Aurélie Winter
Spanish:
- Giselle Martinez de Melendez
- Fernanda Nieto Femenia
- Analin Pedroni
Arabic:
- Mouhamed Fadal Mbacké
Chinese:
- Yujun Lao
Internships
Intellectual Property Watch has offered internships for individuals interested in independent journalism and intellectual property policy-making. There are currently no internships available, but interested candidates may contact info [at] ip-watch [dot] ch.
Intellectual Property Watch was established in 2004 as a non-profit association under Swiss law. Based in Geneva, the work of Intellectual Property Watch is overseen by a Board of Directors. Board members serve in a personal and voluntary capacity for 2 year, renewable terms.
Board of Directors
Dr. Carolyn Deere, Chair and Founder (Australia)
Carolyn is a Senior Researcher at the Global Economic Governance Programme at the University of Oxford where she directs its project on the governance of the global trading system. Carolyn has worked and published on issues of sustainable development, trade and intellectual property for a range of non-governmental and international organizations. She was a member of an International Commission, sponsored by the UK’s Royal Society of Arts, which prepared the Adelphi Charter on Creativity, Innovation and Intellectual Property. She was previously Assistant Director in the Global Inclusion programme of the Rockefeller Foundation where she was responsible for grantmaking on intellectual property and trade, and Bellagio Series on Development and Intellectual Property Policy. Carolyn holds a DPhil (Oxon) and M.A. (SAIS) in International Relations.
Dr. Ruth Okediji (US)
Ruth is the William L. Prosser Professor of Law at the University of Minnesota Law School. She has written and published extensively about intellectual property regulation, and the relationship between developed and developing countries in the international intellectual property system. Ruth received an LLM and SJD from Harvard Law School.
Ms. María Julia Oliva (Argentina)
Ms. María Julia Oliva is Senior Adviser for Access and Benefit Sharing at the Union for Ethical BioTrade. Previously, she was Senior Programme Officer for Trade, Environment and Natural Resources at the International Centre for Trade and Sustainable Development (ICTSD). Julia also worked as a legal consultant for the UNCTAD BioTrade Facilitation Programme and served as the Director of the Intellectual Property and Sustainable Development Project at the Center for International Environmental Law (CIEL). She is a member of the IUCN Commission on Environmental Law and a Research Associate at IQSensanto. Julia earned an LLM Degree in Environmental Law from Northwestern School of Law at Lewis and Clark College and a law degree at the University of Mendoza in Argentin
Mr. Ricardo Meléndez-Ortiz (Colombia)
Ricardo is a co-founder of the International Centre for Trade and Sustainable Development (ICTSD) and its Chief Executive since 1996. A Harvard University graduate, he previously co-founded and was Director General of Fundación Futuro Latinoamericano (Quito, Ecuador), and served as Colombian negotiator for GATT’s Uruguay Round, the UNCED and several other international processes.
Dr. Susan K. Sell (US)
Susan is currently Professor of Political Science and International Affairs at the George Washington University, Washington, D.C and Director of the Institute for Global and International Studies, Elliott School of International Affairs. She has published widely on the politics and history of international policy debates on intellectual property and technology transfer.
Mr. Matthew Stilwell (Australia)
Matthew is currently Managing Director at the Institute for Governance & Sustainable Development. He was formerly a legal counsel to UNEP’s Economics and Trade Branch in Geneva, and a Managing Attorney at the Center for International Environmental Law where he led its work on intellectual property and sustainable development. He holds an LLM from Columbia University School of Law.
Intellectual Property Watch
P.O. Box 2100
1-5, route des Morillons
1211 Geneva 2
Switzerland
Phone: +41 (0)22 791 67 16
Fax: +41 (0)22 791 66 35
Email: info [at] ip-watch [dot] ch
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