Sudden Vacancies At Some International Agencies, Industry Sees New Top Officials, Lawyers Engage In Firm-Hopping

While the World Bank Group and the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) are looking for new leaders following the unexpected resignations of their heads, the International Telecommunication Union re-elected its secretary general. The European Patent Office got three new vice-chairs, and the European Organization for Nuclear Research (CERN) a new president, both starting in January. Associations for the creative industry and the pharmaceutical industry also elected new top officials, and lawyers continued to practice firm-hopping.

International Organisations

After the resignation on 7 January of Jim Yong Kim, President of the World Bank Group, effective 1 February, the group announced on 9 January that the Board of Executive Directors had met to discuss the selection process for the next President of the group. Kristalina Georgieva, World Bank CEO, will assume the role of interim President from 1 February. Yong Kim said that immediately after his departure, he was to join a firm and focus on increasing infrastructure investments in developing countries.

The European Broadcasting Union elected a new Executive Board for the next two years, starting on 1 January. Tony Hall, Director General, BBC, was elected President; and Delphine Ernotte Cunci, CEO, France Télévisions, was elected Vice President.

Newly elected Board members are Ibrahim Eren, Director General of Turkish Radio Television (TRT) since July 2017; Marcello Foa who was appointed President of Radiotelevisione Italiana (Rai) in 2018; Giacomo Ghisani, the Acting Director General of Radio Vaticana; Sergei Pavlov, Director of International Relations and member of the Board of Directors for Channel One Russia; and Gonçalo Reis, President of the Board and CEO of Radio Television Portugal (RTP) since 2015. Cilla Benkö, Director General, Sveriges Radio (Sweden); Petr Dvořák, Director General, Czech Television (Czech Republic); Ulrich Wilhelm, Director General, Arbeitsgemeinschaft der öffentlich-rechtlichen Rundfunkanstalten der Bundesrepublik Deutschland/Bayerischer Rundfunk (Germany): and Gilles Marchand Director General, Société suisse de radiodiffusion et télévision (Switzerland), were re-elected to serve a new term on the Board.

The EBU Assembly also approved the application of the Israeli Public Broadcasting Corporation (IPBC) for full membership of the EBU.

United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) Executive Director Erik Solheim from Norway resigned on 20 November after a report of the UN’s Office of Internal Oversight Services revealed gross travel over-spending. His resignation was effective 22 November. Joyce Msuya of Tanzania was appointed as Acting Executive Director.

The UN International Telecommunication Union in October re-elected Houlin Zhao of China as Secretary General for the next four years, starting on 1 January. Zhao won the position with 176 votes, from 178 ballot papers deposited and contested the position unopposed.

Stephen Rowan from the United Kingdom, Christoph Ernst from Germany, and Nellie Simon from Austria were appointed Vice-Presidents of the European Patent Office (EPO) by the Administrative Council of the European Patent Organisation in October. They took their position on 1 January for a period of five years. Rowan, who served as Director of Patents, Trademarks, Designs, and Tribunals at the UK Intellectual Property Office, was appointed Vice-President Directorate-General Patent Granting Process, and succeeds Alberto Casado Cerviño of Spain. Ernst, who was head of directorate at the German Federal Ministry of Justice and Consumer Protection, was nominated Vice-President Directorate-General Legal and International Affairs, and succeeds Raimund Lutz, from Germany. Ernst also served as Chairman of the Administrative Council of the European Patent Organisation from October 2017 until December 2018. Simon is the new Vice-President of the Directorate-General Corporate Services, taking over from Željko Topić of Croatia. She was Head of Cabinet at the European Union Intellectual Property Office (EUIPO).

Ursula Bassler, Deputy Director at France’s National Institute for Nuclear and Particle Physics, was elected in the fall as 23^rd President of the European Organization for Nuclear Research (CERN) Council, to take function on 1 January 2019 for three years. She takes over from Sijbrand de Jong, who concluded his three-year term at the end of December.

The European Medicines Agency’s (EMA) Pharmacovigilance Risk Assessment Committee (PRAC) elected Martin Huber from Germany in the fall as vice-chair to take over from Álmath Spooner, who served two three-year mandates. Huber is Head of the unit “PRAC, Legal Status, Adverse Reaction Reports, Medication Errors,” at the Federal Institute for Drugs and Medical Devices, in Germany.

Erika Dueñas, former Policy and Advocacy Manager for the Medicines Patent Pool, joined the WHO Public Health, Innovation and Intellectual Property (PHI) team in the fall.

Governments

The US Chamber’s Global Innovation Policy Center (GIPC) announced on 15 January that Jonathan Weinberger became the GIPC’s Senior Vice President. Weinberger joins from the Alliance of Automobile Manufacturers where he served as its first-ever Vice President for Innovation and Technology. Patrick Kilbride, senior vice president of GIPC, will take on expanded responsibilities in spearheading GIPC’s policy work.

Newly appointed Deputy General Counsel for Intellectual Property and Solicitor Thomas Krause was to take his function at the US Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) on 14 January. Krause served as the USPTO’s Deputy Solicitor since 2014.

Kenji Saito, first secretary at the Permanent mission of Japan, covering in particular the World Intellectual Property Organization, left at the end of October. He was replaced by Hiroki Uejima, First Secretary.

Sadre Alam, First Secretary, began representing India at the World Health Organization at the end of summer, while his colleague Animesh Choudhury, Second Secretary & Head of Chancery, started following WIPO.

Katherine Dellar and Felicity Hammond are covering some World Trade Organization issues as well as WIPO for the Australian mission.

Some eleven innovators and creators were celebrated as 2018 IP leaders by the US Chamber of Commerce Global Innovation Policy Center in the fall. Peter O’Doherty, head of the Economic Crime Directorate for the City of London Police, was recognized as an IP Champion for excellence in enforcement, as well as Nick Court, Chief Detective of the Police Intellectual Property Crime Unit for the City of London.

Alvin Roth, founder of the Kidney Exchange and a 2012 Nobel Prize winner, Uzi Hanuni, Maxtech founder and CEO, and Inderjit Jutla, founder of Aluna, a San Francisco-based technology company that offers chronic respiratory patients a system to help them better understand and control lung health, were celebrated as IP champions for excellence in innovation.

Bart Herbison and Steve Bogard, Executive Director and Board President of the Nashville Songwriters Association International (NSAI) respectively were recognized as IP champions for excellence in Advocacy.

IP Champion for excellence in creativity were Kristie Macosko Krieger, Academy Award-nominated producer, serving on the senior leadership team at Amblin Partner, Kira Goldberg, Executive Vice President of Production for 20^th Century Fox, and Mary Wilson, American vocalist, solo artist, and best-selling author.

The IP champion for excellence in IP policy is Liu Chuntian, founding Dean of the Renmin University of China Intellectual Property Academy.

Industry

David Lossignol, Head of Trademarks, Domain Names and Copyrights for Novartis Pharma AG in Basel, was elected 2019 President of the International Trademark Association on 14 January. Lossignol served on INTA’s Board of Directors since 2013, and sits on INTA’s Brands and Innovation Committee.

INTA also elected the following officers for 2019: Ayala Deutsch, Executive Vice President and General Counsel, NBA Properties, Inc. as President-Elect; Tiki Dare, Assistant General Counsel, Oracle Corporation as Vice President; Zeeger Vink, Intellectual Property Director, Maus Frères as Vice President; Jomarie Fredericks, Deputy General Counsel and Chief Intellectual Property Counsel, Rotary International as Treasurer; Dana Northcott, Associate General Counsel-Intellectual Property, Amazon.com, Inc. as Secretary; and Anna Carboni, Partner, Wiggin LLP as Counsel.

David Fish is new Technology Policy Institute (TPI)’s Vice President for communication and external affairs. Fish led communications for Verizon on policy, regulatory, and related legal matters. Fish also directed communications for the US House Committee on Commerce and US Senate Committee on Energy and Natural Resources before his corporate, think tank and consulting careers. TPI also promoted Sarah Oh, researcher at TPI since 2017, as think tank’s new senior fellow. Prior to joining TPI, Oh directed research and operations for the Information Economy Project at the Antonin Scalia Law School.

At the start of the year Dermavant Sciences announced the appointment of Philip Brown as Chief Medical Officer. Brown served as head of global pharmaceutical drug development at Galderma, the pharmaceutical subsidiary of Nestlé Skin Health, and prior to joining Galderma was a senior vice president of clinical development at Lexicon Pharmaceuticals.

Also at the beginning of January, Altavant Sciences appointed Lyn Baranowski as Chief Operating Officer. Prior to joining Altavant, Baranowski served as Senior Vice President of Corporate Development and Strategy at Melinta Therapeutics.

The Recording Industry Association of America has a new head. Mitch Glazier became RIAA’s Chairman and CEO in January. Glazier is former Senior House Judiciary Committee staffer. The RIAA also promoted Michele Ballantyne to Chief Operating Officer. Ballantyne was former Special Assistant to President Bill Clinton, and Special Counsel to then-White House Chief of Staff John Podesta.

The International Federation of Pharmaceutical Manufacturers & Associations (IFPMA) elected David Ricks as its new President in early December for a two-year term. Ricks is Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Eli Lilly and Company. He takes over as president of IFPMA from Ian Read, Chairman of the Board and Chief Executive Officer at Pfizer.

A few days later, on 10 December, IFPMA announced that Unjela Kaleem joined as Director of Communications. Kaleem recently launched the STOP TB Partnership’s interactive civil society hearing advocacy and communications campaign ahead of the UN High Level Meeting on TB. She previously worked for Nestle Oceania and Equatorial Africa.

Paul Fribourg, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Continental Grain Company, joined the Syngenta Board as a Non-Executive Director. Erik Fyrwald, Chief Executive Officer of Syngenta, for his part, will join the Board as an Executive Director.

John Calcio was appointed new Chief Revenue Officer of TrademarkNow in November. Calcio joins from Qstream, where he served as VP of Sales.

Red Points, a Barcelona-based technology company offering solutions for detecting and enforcing online IP infringements, announced in October that Baxter Denney joined as Chief Marketing Officer. Previously Denney has held senior marketing roles at SaaS digital and cloud performance platform New Relic.

The International Publishers Association elected Hugo Setzer as its President and Sheikha Bodour bint Sultan Al Qasimi as Vice President in October. Both took on the function on 1 January 2019. Setzer has been IPA Vice President since 2016. Al Qasimi funded “Kalimat Group”, the United Arab Emirates’ first publishing house dedicated solely to publishing Arabic children’s books. Setzer is CEO of Manual Moderno, which is a leading publishing house in the fields of medicine and psychology in Spanish language, located in Mexico.

UK-based Crescendo Biologics announced [pdf] in October that it appointed Richard Williams as Senior VP Chemistry, Manufacturing and Controls, as well as new Contract Development and Manufacturing Organization partner for its lead programme on T-cell enhancer.

The US-Taiwan Business Council elected [pdf] Mike Splinter as Chairman of the Board in September. Splinter succeeds Paul Wolfowitz, who served in the role since 2008. Splinter was former Chairman & CEO of Applied Materials, former Executive Vice President of Intel Corporation, and is currently general partner at WISC Partners and serves as Chairman of the board at NASDAQ.

The Board of Directors of the World Federation of Science Journalists announced that Christophe Bourillon was appointed as new Executive Director. Bourillon founded and led various industry associations, such as the European Wind Energy Association.

The International Confederation of Music Publishers (ICMP) appointed John Phelan, an Irish national, as its Director General in September, effective as of 1 October. Phelan succeeds Coco Carmona.

NGOs / Academia

Jonathon Nevett was named CEO of US-based Public Interest Registry, the nonprofit operator of the .org domain, last month. Nevett co-founded Donuts Inc. in 2010 and helped to raise funds to form a registry of more than 240 top-level domains. He served as Donuts’ Executive Vice President for Corporate Affairs.

The Drugs for Neglected Diseases initiative (DNDi) appointed Joelle Tanguy as Director of External Affairs in October. Tanguy served as Under-Secretary General for Humanitarian Diplomacy with the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies, and as Director of External Relations for GAVI, the Vaccine Alliance.

Charlotte Slaiman joined Public Knowledge as new Policy Counsel in September, to focus on competition issues and digital platforms. Prior to joining Public Knowledge, Slaiman worked in the Anticompetitive Practices Division of the Federal Trade Commission.

Law Firms

At the start of the year, Perkins Coie announced the addition of Partner John Delaney to its Technology Transactions & Privacy practice in New York. Before joining Perkins Coie, Delaney was co-chair of the Media practice and former co-chair of the Technology Transaction practice at Morrison & Foerster.

Hosang Lee joined Morgan Lewis intellectual property practice as a partner resident in Washington DC. Lee comes from McDermott Will & Emery.

Nine O’Melveny lawyers have been named new partners starting January 2019. Alicja Biskupska-Haas, Hannah Chanoine, Mia Gonzalez, and Joseph Zujkowski are in New York, while Susannah Howard is in San Francisco, Dimitri Portnoi, Daniel Suvor and Xin-Yi (Vincent) Zhou are in Los Angeles, and Ke Zhu is in Hong Kong.

Andreas Balsiger Betts, former Head of Legal Affairs at Swissmedic, joined Sidley Austin LLP in Switzerland, in December as a Senior Advisor. Olivier Goarnisson, also joined the firm’s life sciences practice as counsel, in December. Goarnisson is former Director, Medical Affairs Operations Europe at Celgene.

Arent Fox announced in December its merger with Boston-based law firm Posternak Blankstein & Lund LLP, effective 1 January.

Lisa Meyerhoff and Myall Hawkins joined Seyfarth Shaw LLP Litigation Department and Intellectual Property practice in Houston in December. They both come from Baker & McKenzie LLP, where they were members of the firm’s international intellectual property team.

Perkins Coie relocated its San Diego office in December to a new 37,000 square-foot space in the city.

Morrison & Foerster promoted 12 lawyers to partnership with effect in January. Amanda Aikman of the Litigation Department, based in New York; Caitlin Sinclaire Blythe, a member of the Litigation Department, based in San Francisco; Andy Campbell, a member of the Corporate Department, based in Washington DC; Dario de Martino, a member of the Corporate Department, based in New York; Marc-Alain Galeazzi, a member of the Financial Services Group, based in New York; Annabel Gillham, a member of the Litigation Department, based in London; Akira Irie, a member of the Intellectual Property Group, based Tokyo; Nicole Johnson, a member of the State and Local Tax Group, based in New York; Jim Krenn, a member of the Corporate Department, based in San Diego; Joyce Liou, a member of the Intellectual Property Group, based in San Francisco; David Newman, a member of the National Security and Global Risk and Crisis Management Groups, based in Washington DC; and Julia Schwalm, a member of the Commercial Litigation practice, based in Berlin.

Neal Gerber Eisenberg announced in November that Ian Block joined as Partner in the intellectual property practice group. Block joined from Kirkland & Ellis LLP.

Bradley Walz joined Barnes & Thornburg in November, as partner in the Corporate Department in Minneapolis. Walz was previously a shareholder at Winthrop & Weinstine. Walz also is an adjunct professor in the University of St. Thomas School of Law’s trademark clinic.

Jennifer Stoddart, who served as the Privacy Commissioner of Canada from 2003 to 2013 as a strategic advisor joined Fasken in November.

BakerHostetler announced in the fall that trial attorney Douglas Grady joined the firm’s intellectual property Group as a partner, in the Seattle office. Grady joins from the Seattle office of Foster Pepper PLLC.

Shane Brun joined the San Francisco office of Venable LLP’s Intellectual Property Litigation Practice as a partner in the fall.

Also in the fall, Dykema announced that Robert Freed, and Conrad Hansen joined as Senior Counsels, from Moore & Hansen, founded in Minneapolis in 1885. Moore & Hansen was Minnesota’s first patent, trademark, and copyright law firm. It was led by both Freed and Hansen.

Mike Pierides and Simon Lightman joined Morgan Lewis in London as partners in October.

Mintz announced the arrival in the fall of Michael Graif, joining the New York office. Graif previously chaired the intellectual property practice at Curtis, Mallet-Prevost, Colt & Mosle LLP. Graif is also a Lecturer in Law at the University of Pennsylvania Law School.

Rimon Law announced in the fall the addition of four intellectual property partners: Karineh Khachatourian, Amir Tabarrok, David Xue, and Justin Zahrt. Also joining Rimon law is associate Nikolaus Woloszczuk and three staff members. All eight people are coming from the Silicon Valley office of Duane Morris. The group joins a IP team of 19 partners, with the previous additions of Patrick Kuehl Jr, Matt Poppe, Zheng Liu, Gabriel Gregg, Peng Chen, and Max Waldbaum.

Eversheds Sutherland announced at the end of summer the appointment of Cedric Lam as a partner in the corporate team and Head of Intellectual Property, Greater China. Prior to joining Eversheds Sutherland, Lam was a partner at Dorsey & Whitney in Hong Kong.

Britt Anderson joined Perkins Coie’s trademark, copyright, media & brand protection practice in Palo Alto at the end of the summer. Matt Oshinsky, Adrian Rich and Wendy Moore had joined previously. Anderson was previously a partner at K&L Gates.

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Image Credits: Flickr – Thomas Hawk