CIPA’s new President outlines his plans for 2023

On Wednesday 2 November 2022, at the 140th Annual General Meeting of CIPA, Daniel Chew was confirmed as President with effect from 1 January 2023. Daniel was not able to attend the AGM as he was travelling in Japan, but sent a message in advance of the meeting outlining his plans for his presidential year.

Congratulations to Alasdair Poore for successfully completing his second term as President. On behalf of Council and CIPA members, I would like to thank Alasdair for his contributions to CIPA, and look forward to continuing to work with him as Immediate Past President in 2023. I gained valuable insights from Alasdair during my time as Vice-President, particularly at our recent meetings with various intellectual property organisations at the Asian Patent Attorneys Association (‘APAA’) conference in Busan, South Korea in October 2022.

I would like to take the opportunity to thank Alicia Instone for her outstanding contributions as an officer of CIPA for the past three years. Alicia’s contribution has been tremendous, not only in her year as President, but also through her continuing contribution to CIPA’s work on the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership (‘CPTPP’), her involvement in various committees, as well as her support in a number of our regional meetings.

I also extend congratulations to those elected and reelected to Council, and thank those leaving Council.

I was asked to set out my priorities for 2023 at the AGM, but I was fortunate to have already discussed them at the American Intellectual Property Law Association (‘AIPLA’) Annual Meeting in the US the week before, where I shared CIPA’s priorities at meetings with the President of the Intellectual Property Institute of Canada (‘IPIC’) and the Executive Committee of the AIPLA.

International connections are important to support our work, be it in private practice or industry, and this has grown since Brexit. As most of you may already know, I first became involved with CIPA through the work of the International Liaison Committee (‘ILC’). I am always keen to use my international contacts for the benefit of our profession, particularly to promote the excellence of the UK IP professions. In 2023, my top priority as President will be to promote UK patent attorneys’ rights of representation at the Unified Patent Court (‘UPC’). CIPA has been highlighting UK (European-qualified) attorneys’ rights before the UPC, and I would like CIPA to emphasise why UK patent attorneys are better placed to represent clients in front of the UPC. To that end, we have created a promotional video, in a number of languages, on this which is now live online (www.youtube. com/watch?v=SY7SC4p3QSU), and I encourage our members to share it more widely with their contacts.

Another priority is to continue supporting the ILC which works hard to strengthen CIPA’s friendships with key IP organisations around the world and helps them understand our positions on any likely impact of new free trade agreements on IP. Catriona Hammer, Alicia Instone, Neil Lampert and Lee Davies have made significant efforts to engage with the government and explain CIPA’s position on the likely impact of CPTPP negotiations on our profession. To support their work, the ILC has also reached out to important IP organisations in CPTPP participants countries to help us communicate our positions to their respective government.

It is important that CIPA continues to engage more widely with members across the UK and is less Londoncentric. Regional meetings returned in 2022 and there is a full programme for 2023 (see page 55). Last year also saw the return of in-person patent case law seminars in Glasgow, Manchester and Bristol, as well as London. In 2022, I enjoyed our CIPA ‘happy hours’ in London but it was great to attend a CIPA drinks in Cambridge too. The first happy hour of 2023 returns on 1 March with others to follow. We hope those nearby will join us for networking and a drink or two. In 2023 other CIPA events will be held outside London, in April the second Student Conference will be in Birmingham, the Life Sciences Conference will be in Brighton in November, and for the first time CIPA Congress will be held outside London, in Cambridge in October. I look forward to supporting these events and networking with members across the UK.

At the 140th AGM, it was declared that Matt Dixon will be installed as VicePresident with effect from 1 January 2023, and as President with effect from 1 January 2024.

Another priority that is close to my heart is diversity and inclusion. CIPA has made good progress in recent times on diversity and inclusion (‘D&I’), both through its support of IP Inclusive and the work of its new D&I Committee. But there is a lot of work still to be done to attract women and people from ethnic minority groups into the profession. I would like CIPA to lead the way in promoting D&I in the IP profession. I would like to see more diversity in our membership, in Council, in committees, and in the events that we host. I will be working with the D&I Committee to explore ways in which we can achieve this, and I hope that our members will support us in these efforts.

Finally, I would like to thank the CIPA staffs and to say how amazing they are in their respective roles. I am grateful for their support and look forward to working closely with them in my Presidential year.

Daniel Chew is Partner and Head of Asia Group at Haseltine Lake Kempner (HLK). He made history as CIPA’s first Asian President.