This Dawn Ellmore blog looks at changes at the top in the European IP (intellectual property) world.

Current European Patent Office (EPO) president Benoît Battistelli has been elected as Chair of the Administrative Council for International Intellectual Property Studies (CEIPI).

The CEIPI was founded in 1963 by Strasbourg University to focus on training IP (intellectual property) specialists. They particularly specialise in preparing for the European Qualifying Exam.

“Delighted and honoured” to Chair

Mr Battistelli was quoted as saying: “I am delighted and honoured to have been elected to this post. We live in a knowledge-based economy, so the training provided by the CEIPI for intellectual property specialists is an essential task and vital contribution to Europe’s excellence in IP.”

His appointment was announced at the end of November, and he is mandated for three years. Mr Battistelli succeeds António Campinos, the current Executive Director of the European Union Intellectual Property Office (EUIPO), who chaired the Council for four years.

Former Chairs include the EPO’s first president, Bob van Bentham and Ingo Kober who took the position in 2000.

New EPO president

In a role reversal, Mr Campinos of Portugal has in turn been elected as the next president of the EPO. He will succeed Mr Battistelli on 1 July 2018, who has held the role since 2010.

Mr Campinos will be the first head of the agency from southern Europe and will hold the position for a five-year term. His current role (executive director of the EUIPO) is concerned with handling EU trade marks.

In the past Mr Campinos was president of the Portuguese Patent Institute (INPI) and the Portuguese representative on the EPO Administrative Council.

Strengths to serve European innovation

The election was on 10 October at the Administrative Council, which consists of delegations from all member states. It’s the EPO’s legislative body and is responsible for holding a supervisory role over the activities of the office.

During Mr Battistelli’s current stint as president, patent filings rose significantly. In response to the election of Mr Campinos, he said: “This decisive outcome shows how the European Patent Organisation has matured in terms of implementing strong governance and providing leadership in decision making that will serve European innovation.”

Mr Campinos was up against one other candidate, an Italian Judge from the International Criminal Court called Cuno Tarfusser.

About the EPO

The EPO is one of Europe’s biggest public service institutions and was set up on the basis of the 1973 European Patent Convention (EPC). The organisation came into force in 1977 and has 38 member states, including all 28 EU members plus Albania, the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia, Iceland, Liechtenstein, Monaco, Norway, San Marino, Serbia, Switzerland and Turkey.

Its primary task is to administrate and oversee granting European patents by the European Patent Office, under the EPC. The EPO has a centralised procedure for granting patents, allowing inventors to gain protection in around 42 countries, which covers a market of 700 million people.

About Dawn Ellmore Employment

Dawn Ellmore Employment was incorporated in 1995 and is a market leader in intellectual property and legal recruitment.