As part of the World IP Day 2013 activities in Kenya, CIPIT will host a special intellectual property (IP) debate organised by the Aids Law Project (ALP) between students drawn from the local universities. The topic of this debate is: how the Novartis and Patricia Asero court decisions affect public health in developing countries. Although … Continue reading »
Tag Archives: Africa
Intellectual Property in Kenya / Intellectual Property in Uganda / Kenya Industrial Property Institute KIPI / Trade marks
L’Oréal Acquires Nice & Lovely Trademark in Multi-Billion Shilling Deal
Media reports (here, here and here) indicate that the world’s largest multinational cosmetics company L’Oréal has acquired Kenya’s Interconsumer Products Ltd’s flagship Nice & Lovely brands, in a multi-million dollar acquisition reported this past week. L’Oréal opened shop in Nairobi in late 2011 and has for the past 18 months been in talks with Interconsumer … Continue reading »
Plant Breeders vs Farmers: SADC Draft Protocol for the Protection of New Plant Varieties
Plant Breeders rights became an accepted branch of intellectual property with the adoption of the International Convention for the Protection of New Varieties of Plants (UPOV) in 1961. The Convention protects the variety of the plant not the plant itself therefore the subject matter of protection is the variety and not the whole plant. A … Continue reading »
To Photocopy or Not to Photocopy: The Role of the Reproduction Rights Society in Kenya
One of the local newspapers recently published an article titled: “Can’t someone stop this photocopying madness?”, which raises the alarm over high levels of illegal photocopying especially in tertiary institutions of learning, namely our universities. The writer explains: We were taught in classes that photocopying a book without the requisite permission of the copyright holder … Continue reading »
Anti-Counterfeit / Copyright / Intellectual Property in Kenya / IP News / Kenya Copyright Board KeCoBo / Trade marks
State of Kenya’s Intellectual Property Protection and Enforcement Regime
A study commissioned by the International Chamber of Commerce (ICC) Business Action to Stop Counterfeiting and Piracy (BASCAP) initiative reports that Kenya’s current intellectual property (IP) rights regime performs poorly in international gauges, ranking 95th of 130 countries in the IPR Index and 106th of 140 economies in the Global Competitiveness Index 2010. The BASCAP … Continue reading »
An Intellectual Property Perspective of Kenya’s 2013 General Elections
At about 14h42 local time on March 9th 2013, the Chairperson of the Independent Elections and Boundaries Commission (IEBC) declared that Uhuru Muigai Kenyatta was the duly elected fourth President of the Republic of Kenya. In an earlier post titled: “Words for the Unwary: Intellectual Property and Political Parties in Kenya”, this blogger anticipated … Continue reading »
Collective Rights Management / Copyright / Intellectual Property in Kenya / International Intellectual Property / IP News / Music Copyright Society of Kenya MCSK
Balamine Ouattara: New Regional Director for African Copyright Societies
CISAC, the International Confederation of Societies of Authors and Composers, works towards increased recognition and protection of creators’ rights. CISAC was founded in 1926 and is a non-governmental, non-profit organisation. Its headquarters are in Paris, with regional offices in Budapest, Santiago de Chile, Johannesburg and Singapore. CISAC now reports that Mr. Balamine Ouattara has joined … Continue reading »
Event: Creative Commons Kenya “School of Open” Launch
CIPIT, as the Public Lead for Creative Commons Kenya, has organised the Launch of a Creative Commons “School of Open” on the 23rd of February 2013 at Precious Blood Secondary School, Riruta. Through this event, CIPIT in partnership with the National Council for Law Reporting (Legal Lead for Creative Commons Kenya) and jamlab aims to … Continue reading »
Konza or Bust: Intellectual Property and Africa’s Silicon Savannah
A few weeks ago, the President Mwai Kibaki launched a KES 900 Billion ($14.5bn) project to build a new technology city: Konza, intended to be an IT business hub and dubbed “Africa’s Silicon Savannah”. Many may know that Konza is part of the government’s Vision 2030 initiative to improve much-neglected infrastructure over the next two … Continue reading »
When Public Interest IP Goes Wrong: CIPIT Slams PIIPA
IPKenya is pleased with CIPIT’s reaction to a recent notice that PIIPA was looking for pro-bono assistance from Kenyan intellectual property professionals. In a post today titled “Open Letter to PIIPA on Puzzling Pro-Bono Assistance Request”, CIPIT openly confronts PIIPA on its bizarre decision to grant a seemingly well-financed company access to “precious pro-bono resources” … Continue reading »
