Teaching IP Law Conference 2023

The UCL Institute of Brand and Innovation Law (IBIL) is delighted to host 'Teaching IP Law 2023' - a conference to celebrate the launch of the book: 'Teaching Intellectual Property Law' in June 2023.

IBIL is delighted to be hosting Teaching IP Law, a conference taking place on 21st June 2023, between 10am and 5:30pm, to mark the publication of Teaching Intellectual Property Law: Strategy and Management (2023, Edward Elgar). The conference will be chaired by the book's editors, Sabine Jacques and Ruth Soetendorp.

About the Conference

To celebrate the publication of the first edition of Teaching Intellectual Property Law: Strategy and Management, we are inviting IP Law educators to come together to share their teaching and learning innovations and best practices. Reflecting the themes of this ground-breaking book, the conference hopes to ignite a lively discussion on the future of IP educational practices both within and beyond the Law School.

The conference and book launch will be followed by IBIL's Annual Sir Hugh Laddie Lecture, this year being given by Judge Rian Kalden, Vice-President of the new Unified Patent Court. Registration for the conference can include a place at this prominent event in the annual IP calendar.

Call for Abstracts

The call for submissions from those who are interested at presenting at the conference closed on Tuesday 2nd May 2023, and those who have had their abstracts accepted have been notified.

Registration for Attendees

All the delegate places have now been filled, but if you would like to be added to the wait list, please email ibil@ucl.ac.uk (outlining the nature of your interest in IP education).

About the Book

Intellectual Property (IP) knowledge is central to culture, innovation, and enterprise, and so it is unsurprising that IP surfaces in curricula within and beyond the law school. Teaching Intellectual Property Law: Strategy and Management (2023, Edward Elgar) edited by Sabine Jacques and Ruth Soetendorp, focuses on the profile of the contemporary learner. Its collection of contributions encourages IP educators to adopt new approaches to imparting knowledge that will empower IP students of all disciplines and at all levels. In a collection of 24 chapters from 30 authors, this work establishes a comprehensive strategy for teaching intellectual law that encompasses techniques to strengthen student engagement, introduces multi-disciplinary approaches, promotes student collaboration, utilises new technologies, advances employability-related skills and promotes a variety of freely available resources.

You can find out more about the book, and pre-order it here, ahead of publication on 13 June 2023. Add the book to your basket and apply the discount code TIPL35 at the checkout to secure a 35% conference discount.

Our Conference Chairs

Dr Sabine Jacques is an Associate Professor of IP law at the University of East Anglia. Notably, she is the author of The Parody Exception in Copyright Law (OUP, 2019), the creator of IntangAbility: The IP Game.

Professor Ruth Soetendorp teaches Intellectual Property management at Bayes Business School, City University of London. At Bournemouth University she co-founded the Centre for Intellectual Property Policy and Management. Her research interest continues to be the IP education of IP rights creators. She has been delighted to contribute to the international development of IP education.

Our Keynote Speakers

The Rt Hon Professor Sir Robin Jacob is the Sir Hugh Laddie Chair of Intellectual Property Law at UCL and Director of the UCL Institute of Brand and Innovation Law. He also acts as an arbitrator, mediator, expert determiner and expert witness both in IP and commercial cases.

Having read Natural Sciences at Trinity College Cambridge, Sir Robin then simultaneously read for the Bar and took an LLB from the LSE. He was called to the Bar by Gray’s Inn in 1965. He practiced at the IP Bar from 1967, was appointed Queen’s Counsel in 1981 and had a busy international practice (Hong Kong, Singapore, Europe, USA, Australia) until he was appointed to the Bench in 1993. From 1997 to 2001 he was Supervising Chancery Judge for Birmingham, Bristol and Cardiff. Sir Robin was appointed a Lord Justice of Appeal in October 2003. In the Court of Appeal, he regularly sat on both IP and commercial cases. He formally retired from the Court of Appeal in May 2011 to take up his current appointment, continuing to sit from time to time in the Court of Appeal until April 2016.

Sir Robin continues to be active in IP education. As well as being a regular contributor to student IP classes and seminars at UCL, he is also President of the Association of Law Teachers and a co-author of the Guidebook to Intellectual Property since its third edition. He is also an Hon. Fellow of both the LSE and St Peter’s College, Oxford, an Hon. LID of the University of Wolverhampton, and also President of the Intellectual Property Judges’ Association (the association of European IP, particularly patent, judges). He was Chairman of the Advisory Panel on the Selection and Training of Judges for the Unitary Patent Court until the UK withdrew from the project.

Professor Uma Suthersanen is Professor of Global Intellectual Property Law at Queen Mary University of London, and is the current Director of the Queen Mary Intellectual Property Research Institute.

Uma gained her degrees in law from the National University of Singapore and Queen Mary University of London. She began her academic career at Queen Mary first as the Herchel Smith Research Fellow, becoming a tenured lecturer in 2001. In 2009, she was conferred a Personal Chair at the Centre for Commercial Law Studies. Uma’s research encompasses legal, socio-economic, and comparative aspects of intellectual and intangible property. She has served as a consultant and given evidence to international and regional bodies including WIPO, UNESCO, UNCTAD, European Parliament, European Commission, and the Governments of Israel and Singapore. More recently, she has been invited to sit as a WIPO expert on the Ad hoc Committee on traditional knowledge and traditional cultural expressions, IGC 46, February 2023. She sits on the Executive Committee of the British Literary and Artistic Copyright Association (ALAI-UK), having previously served as Chair between 2006-2010.

Uma is a Visiting Professor on the WIPO Academy Joint LLM programmes with the (i) University of Ankara, and (ii) Shanghai International College of Intellectual Property-University of Tongji. She is also on the Visiting Faculty for the WIPO Academy programme with the British Copyright Council and UK Intellectual Property Office, and an Overseas Fellow of the I.P. Academy of Singapore.

Our Speakers

Dr Jocelyn Bosse is a Lecturer in Intellectual Property and Information Law at King's College London. She teaches patent and trade mark law, along with research-led teaching on the law of geographical indications and plant variety rights at both undergraduate and postgraduate levels. Jocelyn was nominated for a King's Education Award in 2023. She completed her PhD at the University of Queensland as part of the ARC-funded project, 'Harnessing Intellectual Property to Build Food Security'.

Caroline Coles is a senior lecturer in IP at Aston University, built on her previous career as a practising solicitor in IP and an international marketing manager with The Boots Company. She is the chair of the IP and Technology Group within the European IP Teachers Network and has received a National Teacher Fellowship for her work on technology enhanced learning. She publishes on IP and technology and Sustainability in Higher Education.

Dr Janice Denoncourt is an Associate Professor at Nottingham Trent University, having began her IP career in private practice and as an in-house lawyer. She now leads the Intellectual Property Research Group at Nottingham Law School. Janice has designed and delivered a variety of intellectual property modules at undergraduate, post-graduate and professional levels in Law and Business Schools, using culturally diverse IP case studies to promote the inclusive and responsible deployment of IP rights. She is a longstanding member of the European Intellectual Property Teachers' Network (EIPTN) and former Co-Chair. Janice has authored several IP education texts and her research on IP law education has been published in the European Journal of Law and Technology and the Nottingham Law Journal.

Dr Matt Fisher is a Senior Lecturer at UCL Laws and is Co-Director of the UCL Institute of Brand and Innovation Law. Matt's particular research interest is patent law (but stresses that this should not be held against him), and his work adopts theoretical, doctrinal and comparative law perspectives. He teaches across all fields of intellectual property law at both undergraduate and postgraduate levels, including law students and those in other Faculties. In June 2023, Matt's teaching was recognised with an award of both a UCL Education Award and a UCL Student Choice Award.

Dr Helen Gubby was called to the Bar in London, and later worked as an advocate for a Dutch law firm. Having left private practice, she works as a senior lecturer at the Erasmus University, Rotterdam, teaching intellectual property to business students, as well as English legal terminology in the law school. Her PhD, completed in 2011, related to the development of patent law during the early phase of the Industrial Revolution in England (1750s-1830s).

Bartolomeo Meletti works as Creative Director for CREATe, the UK Copyright and Creative Economy Centre at the University of Glasgow. In addition, he is the Education and Research Executive of Learning on Screen, a charity and membership organisation specialised in the use of moving image and sound in education and research. Since its inception, Bart has led the development of CopyrightUser.org - the most visited copyright information website in the UK, which has attracted more than 2 million unique visitors since 2014. Recently, as part of the H2020 consortium, ReCreating Europe, Bart has produced the EU version of the website: CopyrightUser.EU.

Dinusha Mendis is Professor of Intellectual Property and Innovation Law and Director of the Centre for Intellectual Property Policy and Management (CIPPM) at Bournemouth University, specialising in copyright law, copyright licensing and copyright policy. Recent funded projects in this area have included commissioned research for the UK Intellectual Property Office, EU Intellectual Property Office, European Commission and KnowledgeRights21. She is a member of various national and international executive committees including being a member of the Metaverse Governance Team of the World Economic Forum (WEF). In terms of teaching, Dinusha leads a number of IP units on the UG and PG programmes and is Director of the PGCert IP course.

Chris Morrison is the Copyright and Licensing Specialist at the Bodleian Libraries, University of Oxford, responsible for copyright policy, licences, training and advice. He was previously the Copyright, Licensing and Policy Manager at the University of Kent, Copyright Assurance Manager at the British Library and before that worked for music collecting society PRS for Music. Chris holds a masters in copyright law at King’s College London and his dissertation explored the interpretation by UK universities of 'Illustration for Instruction' - Section 32 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988. Chris Morrison, along with Jane Secker, runs copyrightliteracy.org, and they are co-chairs of the ALT Copyright and Online Learning Special Interest Group and are members of the Universities UK Copyright Negotiation and Advisory Committee which negotiates with collective management organisations for UK HE institutions.

Dr Aislinn O'Connell has been a Lecturer in Law at Royal Holloway since January 2018. Her research interest lies in the interaction of intellectual property law with culture, focusing on the protections or lack thereof which are available to media other than those traditionally covered by intellectual property provisions. Between January 2020 and April 2023, Aislinn served as the Hon Secretary of the Association of Law Teachers, and she continues to serve on the Committee.

Kathryn Penaluna is Enterprise Manager at the University of Wales Trinity St David (UWTSD), where her role includes supporting and developing student and graduate businesses. UWTSD has an excellent track record for graduate start-ups and businesses, receiving the Triple E European Entrepreneurial University of the Year Award in 2022. With a background in the financial services sector and having also managed a graphic design studio, Kath's experience of the worlds of banking (business) and of design (creativity) has influenced her curriculum development. She is an internationally renowned researcher on enterprise education and a regular presenter at conferences and workshops. Her recent research has focussed on the role of innovative and creative thought within enterprise and entrepreneurship mind set development.

Roxanne Peters is an IP educator based at the University of Arts, London. She works internationally at the intersection of IP law, creative education, ethics and enterprise. Having worked in intellectual property strategy, advocacy and practice at the Victoria and Albert Museum, London and for open culture platform Europeana Foundation, her approach to IP education has always been practice-led for non-legal communities, focusing on inclusive and democratic ways to connect. She enjoys connecting with creatives, encouraging self-led approaches to recognise the value of their IP and copyright for creative agency, as part of their business strategy and as a tool to activate positive change. She co-designed an IP resource to support and encourage wider awareness of IP thinking within the creative industries and strives to continue to challenge colonial legacies of IP law and education.

Jane Secker is Senior Lecturer in Educational Development at City, University of London. She leads the modules related to digital education and digital literacies and is Programme Director of the Masters in Academic Practice. She is Chair of the CILIP Information Literacy Group and a member of the Copyright Advisory Panel which is a governance group of the UK’s Intellectual Property Office. Jane, along with Chris Morrison, runs copyrightliteracy.org, and they are co-chairs of the ALT Copyright and Online Learning Special Interest Group and are members of the Universities UK Copyright Negotiation and Advisory Committee which negotiates with collective management organisations for UK HE institutions.

Joe Sekhon is Associate Head for Research and Innovation (Innovation Lead) at the School of Law, University of Portsmouth. He is also a Visiting Professor in IP Law at Bocconi University (Milan) and Paris Nanterre University. Joe's research and innovation interests focus on the relationship between IP education and entrepreneurship. He secured funding from the UKIPO to establish an IP clinic (iPass) for students and graduate entrepreneurs. He is currently leading the EPO's flagship online Modular IP Education Framework (MIPEF); a digital platform designed to educate Masters and PhD students across EPO member states on the importance of IP to their studies.

Liam Sunner is a Lecturer (Education) in Law at Queen’s University Belfast, where he teaches EU Law, IP Law, and Law and Technology modules across the various Undergraduate and Postgraduate Programmes. His research areas relate to the intersections of IP law, human rights, and EU External Relations Law.

Thorsten Lauterbach is a Teaching Excellence Fellow at the Robert Gordon University in Aberdeen, where he teaches Intellectual Property Law to both undergraduate and postgraduate students. While his passions lie predominantly in pedagogy, he is also keen on researching aspects of substantive IP law, in particular copyright law and authorship, and more recently trade mark law. He is a regular speaker/presenter at conferences, e.g. SLS, BILETA, EIPTN and SCOTLIN (Scottish Law & Innovation Network) events, at the latter as co-founder. Raising the profile of IP beyond HEIs has been close to his heart, too: For many years, he has been collaborating with students to establish an annual World IP Day event at RGU, one of usualy only two in Scotland.

The Conference Programme: View or download the full Conference Programme.

The Conference Chairs would like to thank the following institutions whose generosity and support has made this conference possible: