Changes At Top Of The UN; Recruitment Ongoing 15/03/2016 by Catherine Saez, Intellectual Property Watch 1 Comment This year will be the last in office for United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki-moon. A number of Eastern European candidates are being proposed by their governments to be the next secretary general. The UN Framework Convention on Climate Change, as well as the UN Environment Programme are expected to have a new head by summer. Meanwhile, chairs are actively revolving in law offices.
China’s Pharmaceutical Sector And The IP Puzzle 15/03/2016 by Intellectual Property Watch Leave a Comment Despite impressive growth, the pharmaceutical sector in China still relies on generic drug production since the majority of domestic companies cannot compete with country-based foreign corporations. Currently, following WTO pressure to oblige China to comply with IP regulations, more and more patented drugs are entering the market. Unfortunately, in spite of a newly introduced IP friendly bill, a puzzling situation persists, writes Pietro Dionisio.
US Senators Release Public Comments On Sovaldi Report 14/03/2016 by Intellectual Property Watch 1 Comment Two key senators today released dozens of comments they received in response to their report on the medicine Sovaldi (and its follow-on Harvoni), whose extreme high prices sparked a debate over pharmaceutical pricing that has created momentum for policy changes.
EPO Union Presses Management To Reverse President’s Disciplinary Actions 14/03/2016 by Dugie Standeford for Intellectual Property Watch 4 Comments The stand-off between European Patent Office President Benoît Battistelli and the Office’s largest staff union continues this week with a 16 March SUEPO demonstration planned during a meeting of the Office’s Administrative Council (AC), which supervises the EPO’s activities.
ETSI Officials Say IPR Policy A Foundation Of Successful Telecoms Standards 14/03/2016 by Dugie Standeford for Intellectual Property Watch Leave a Comment Standards developed by the European Telecommunications Standards Institute for industries such as the mobile communications sector are underlain by an intellectual property rights policy that has proved successful for many years, ETSI officials said at an 11 March Oxfirst webinar.
MSF Challenges Pfizer Patent Application For Pneumonia Vaccine In India 11/03/2016 by Intellectual Property Watch 1 Comment Today, Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF, Doctors Without Borders) filed a patent opposition against Pfizer’s vaccine for pneumonia in India.
ICANN Marrakesh Meeting Reaches Milestone For IANA Transition 11/03/2016 by Monika Ermert for Intellectual Property Watch 2 Comments The Board of the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) at its 55th meeting in Marrakesh today (10 March) passed a milestone resolution to ship a package of proposals by its stakeholder groups to the US National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) to end the latter’s role as an oversight body for the internet. If approved, ICANN will be the next manager of Internet Assigned Numbers Authority (IANA), which is a set of registries for domain names, IP addresses and protocol parameters essential for the functioning of the global internet.
Civil Society Concerns Over US Health Service Plan To Give Exclusive Patent Rights To Sanofi 10/03/2016 by Catherine Saez, Intellectual Property Watch Leave a Comment The United States National Institutes of Health’s decision to consider granting an exclusive licence on patents for a newly government-developed vaccine to Sanofi has prompted a strong reaction from civil society warning against potential high prices and requesting transparency in the process.
Governments Agree To ICANN Accountability Proposals, Giving Green Light For IANA Transition 09/03/2016 by Intellectual Property Watch Leave a Comment Governments gathered at the 55th meeting of the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) in Marrakesh this week have agreed to not object to the final proposal on enhancing ICANN accountability. By the move, the governments cleared the way to allow a potential handover of the management of the central root zone of the domain name system and other core databases to ICANN from the United States Department of Commerce’s National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA).
Gilead Sovaldi Case Reveals Patent-Health Fissures In India 09/03/2016 by Patralekha Chatterjee for Intellectual Property Watch 2 Comments NEW DELHI — Are patient groups, health activists and manufacturers of low-cost generic drugs always on the same page? Do India’s generic companies think alike? The short answer: not necessarily, though their interests have overlapped on many occasions.