NIPC News

John Napier   Jane Lambert As I said in St Andrews Innovation Week , there has been   innovation in St Andrews since the 16th century at least.  John Napier, one of our alumni, invented a precursor of the slide rule and compiled the first logarithms.   Innovation continues at the Eden Campus  which I visited on 15 April 2025 and described in St Andrews Innovation   the very next day. Some of St Andrews Innovation's activities take place online and are available to the public.   Among the most useful are the Lunch & Learn Masterclasses  on YouTube.  These are a series of presentations that have been recorded and posted to YouTube.  The topics are as follows: Lunch and Learn: Pitching Masterclass   Lunch & Learn Entrepreneurship in the Creative Arts   Lunch and Learn: Turn Expertise Into Income Through Consultancy   Lunch & Learn: What is Bootstrap Financing?    Lunch & Learn: Demyst...

Eden Estuary and Former Paper Mill Author Jim Bain   Licence  CC BY-SA 2. 0  Source Wikimedia Commons   Jane Lambert It has been years since I graduated from St Andrews, but the University is still capable of teaching me something new and useful.  Yesterday, I learned a lot about enterprise, innovation and inclusion at a Connect-Ed Network Meet Up on Engaging and Supporting Female Founder s in the Cathedral Room at Walter Bower House on St Andrews's new Eden Campus . The meet-up began with a buffet lunch at 13:00.  I got to meet the Chair, Bonnie Hacking . Programme Manager, Entrepreneurship Centre, two of the speakers, Niki McKenzie , Joint Managing Director at Archangel Investors Limited , and product designer,  Kat Pohorecka , who is also an associate at Edinburgh Innovations , and many of the attendees, before the formal proceedings.  The third speaker was a remarkable recent graduate called  Simone Korsgaard Jensen ,...

  (c) 2023 NIPC all rights reserved St Salvator's College Quad 15 Feb 2023 Jane Lambert Just before Christmas Daniel Alexander KC held in  Oxford University Innovation Ltd v Oxford Nanoimaging Ltd  [2022] EWHC 3200 that the CEO of Oxford Nanoimaging Ltd had been a "consumer" within the meaning of reg 3 (1) of  The Unfair Contract Terms in Consumer Contracts Regulations 1999 when he signed up as a research student at Oxford University.   His contract incorporated Oxford's intellectual property policy which vested the right to apply for patents for student inventions in the University. The learned deputy judge assessed that provision for fairness. On the facts before him, Mr Alexander found that the term had been fair but had he found otherwise the intellectual property policy would not have bound the student.  I discussed the case and its implications in  Patents: Oxford University Innovation Ltd v Oxford Nanoimaging Ltd   on 23 Jan 2023 in N...

Author   Andrew Woodvine   Licence CC BY-SA 2.0   Source Wikimedia Commons   Jane Lambert Yesterday I delivered a seminar on intellectual property law to the teams working on research, innovation, commercialization and partnership support for  Bangor University . They were the professionals who negotiate licence and consultancy agreements and set up spin-off companies to exploit research carried out at the University. I gave PowerPoint presentations on the following topics between 14:00 and 17:00 with short breaks for questions and answers: An overview of intellectual property law covering the difference between intellectual property and intellectual assets, categorization of intellectual property rights, how brands , designs , technology and creativity are protected, the main features of patents , registered designs and supplementary unregistered designs , copyrights , rights in performances , unregistered design rights , trade marks , passing off and ob...

Shanghai Licence CC9.10   Source Wikimedia Common s   Jane Lambert On 19 Dec 2021, I announced the Intellectual Property Office's consultation on standard essential patents and innovation.   The consultation closed on 1 March 2022 and a Summary of Responses to the Call for Views  has been published.   The summary covers the following topics: Section 1 - The balance of the ecosystem and benefits to innovation and consumers Section 2 - Competition and market functioning Section 3 - Transparency Section 4 – Patent infringement and remedies Section 5 – Licensing of SEPs Section 6 -SEP Litigation A list of respondents appears on page 88 of the summary. They include academics. businesses, law firms. patent attorneys and interest groups.  Contributions came from within the UK and beyond. The IPO seems to have received a wide range of views, some of which diverged widely. In view of the breadth of issues and the divergence of the views on the need for gov...

Intellectual Property Office Crown Copyright 2007 Open Government Licence v3.0   Jane Lambert One of the talks that I gave at the Cambridge IP Law Winter School  was "TMT: A SEP and FRAND Overview".    I did not choose that title so I shall try to explain what I think it means.   "TMT" stands for technology, media and telecoms. TMT is a sector where there has been a lot of litigation about "SEPs".  SEPs are "standard-essential patents", that is to say, patents for inventions that a telecoms equipment manufacturer has to use if it is to implement a technical standard.  Technical standards are set by standards-setting organizations ("SSOs"). An important SSO for mobile communications is the European Telecommunications Standards Institute ("ETSI") .   "FRAND" is short for "fair", "reasonable" and "nondiscriminatory" and refers to the terms on which SEP owners are supposed to license the use...

Jane Lambert Before he began his distinguished career in the WIPO, Francis Gurry  was best known for a rather good book on the law of confidence .  It is now in its second edition having been updated and edited by Tanya Aplin, Lionel Bently, Phillip Johnson, and Simon Malynicz. Although the law of confidence can be used to prevent unauthorized use or disclosure of any kind of secret information, it is the legal mechanism by which trade secrets are protected in the United Kingdom.  It is probably the most widely used means of protecting investment in innovation and creativity in this and other common law countries. The law of confidence offers a number of advantages over patents and other registered rights.  It is free. It arises whenever information the use or disclosure of which would benefit the confidant or harm the confider is imparted in circumstances that give rise to an obligation of confidence. It cannot be revoked as a patent can and t...

Kirchberg, Luxembourg Author Zulflow Licence copyright waived by the owner Jane Lambert There has been a lot of interest in space in this country with the passage of the Space Industry Act 2018  in March and the UK Space Authority's recent announcements of the first UK vertical launch facility in the UK (see Lockheed Martin and Orbex to launch UK into new space age   16 July 2018) and the venue for the next UK Space Conference (see Wales announced as host for UK Space Conference 2019   17 July 2018). I have blogged about those developments in Commercial Exploitation of Space: Space Industry Act 2018   10 April 2018 NIPC Law, Space Industry - Licensing Spaceports   11 April 2018 NIPC Law and Newport to host UK Space Conference   19 July 2018 NIPC Severn). There has been similar interest in space in other parts of Europe and in particular Luxembourg which has recently enacted legislation on the exploitation and utilization of space r...

Standard YouTube Licence Jane Lambert Hardly a week goes by without a request for help from an inventor, entrepreneur or other innovator in Africa, Asia or Latin America as well as my own or some other advanced country. Obtaining legal protection for a brand, design, technology or work of art or literature is difficult enough even in the UK. In a less developed country it is so much harder.  Usually, all I can do when I get such a request is to direct the enquirer to his or her national intellectual property office, a local patent or trade mark attorney or lawyer or, occasionally, an inventor's club. The reason why those enquirers seek my help is that legal protection for a product or service is a prerequisite for market success.  Without it countless ideas that could improve the human condition lie unused.  That is obviously bad for the creator or innovator whose life could have been transformed  had he or she taken the product or service to market  but ...

IP Valuation Article  Hidden Value - A Study of the UK Valuation Market   30 Sep 2017 The announcement of the appointment of Metis Partners to market Barratts' intellectual property occurred a few days after the publication of Martin Brassell and Jackie Maguire's study of the British IP valuation industry. The study was commissioned by the IPO to help it understand why businesses do not value their IP rights more often. The authors do not address that question directly but rather preliminary questions on the size of the market and the scope for its expansion. It is an interesting and useful enquiry accompanied by an even more useful and interesting appendix on methodology. The report prompted my own thoughts on valuation and whether it is useful. While agreeing that it can be useful I point out that it is not fully developed and that there is a lot of muddled thinking as to how IP works, I can understand businesses' reluctance to use it. However, that should change...

Jane Lambert I have started a Midlands Engine resource page in NIPC East Midlands that is similar to the Northern Powerhouse resource page  in IP Northwest.  The term is used in relation to a set of initiatives that were announced by Philip Hammond MP, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, in The Midlands Engine Strategy on 9 March 2017. There is also a Midlands Engine Partnership with a website and a number of publications. As to the relevance to IP, I wrote: "The support of enterprise and innovation should result in the creation of more inventions and other intellectual assets as well as funding for development and marketing. Licences will be required to deploy technologies that will improve connectivity and raise productivity." I have begun a short bibliography which includes my article on The Midlands Engine   of 7 Dec 2015 NIPC East Midlands. Call me on +44 (0)20 7404 5252 or send me a message on my contact form  for further information,