On 20 June 2018, The Rt Hon Professor Sir Robin Jacob, Sir Hugh Laddie Chair of Intellectual Property Law, welcomed an attentive audience to the UCL Laws Institute of Brand and Innovation Law for the 10th Annual Sir Hugh Laddie Lecture. Over 400 IP academics, professionals and students, as well as distinguished members of the judiciary, gathered to hear His Honour Michael Fysh QC, SC deliver his talk entitled 'Apologia pro vita sua: A hifi retrospective and a modest prospective'.
Rather than speculating on recent developments in the field of IP or commenting on recent case law, the second judge of the former Patents County Court spoke engagingly of his own experiences: good, bad and neutral, over fifty years as an IP practitioner.
Having explained that the talk - 'A defence of my life' - could be sub-titled: 'How things have changed', the story tracked the speaker's time from a disappointed organic chemist at Oxford, to the day Mr Laddie arrived in Chambers as a pupil and to his near demise in the Caribbean at the hands of the Mafia. The talk managed to weave together seamlessly topics as far-ranging as toothpaste, elephant steeple chases, peanuts in hats and explosive devices, as well as offering a viewpoint on the value of ADR and file wrappers in IP disputes.
A recording of the talk is available to view here.