#ipkenya Weekly Dozen: 31/08

• Ethiopia: Gearing up the postal sector to drive development [UPU]
• Egypt: Mo Salah accuses Football Association of ignoring image rights [BBC]
• Ghana: ARIPO launches Masters in Intellectual Property at KNUST [Going Places]
• Nigeria: ‘White gold’ – GM cotton hope for troubled textile industry [GLP]
• South Africa: Collecting society SAMRO under fire over multi-million US Dollar Dubai investment [Apparently]
• Zimbabwe: ARIPO Magazine Vol.8 No.2 is out [Get Your Copy Here]
• Kenya: Struggle to modernise traditional medicine is far from won [The Star]
• Double Trademark Law Whammy this week over at Afro-IP [Afro Leo & Friends]
• ICYMI: This Blogger is Now A Member of the Copyright Tribunal [Shameless Plug]
• New Paper Looks At Differential Protection For TK, Folklore [IP-Watch]
• Creative Markets and Copyright in the Fourth Industrial Era: Reconfiguring the Public Benefit for a Digital Trade Economy [Okediji]
• 5th Global Congress on Intellectual Property and the Public Interest [Register Here]

For more news stories and developments, please check out #ipkenya on twitter and feel free to share any other IP/ICT-related items that you may come across.

Have a great week-end!

#ipkenya Weekly Dozen: 24/08

• Kofi Annan 1938 – 2018 [UN News]
• TIDAL and MTN Uganda partner to bring music streaming to African customers [Official]
• Unlocking Disruptive Technologies and Local Knowledge for Climate Resilience [CIF]
• How State intervention could boost the fortunes of Kenya’s pharmaceutical sector [Captain Obvious]
• Court Stops DStv in Nigeria [tekedia]
• Rwandans launch first delivery drones in Africa [Ventures Africa]
• Kenya: Anti-Counterfeit Agency digitizes operations to tame rogue business practices [Standard]
• South Africa: Where does graffiti stand when it comes to copyright? [BIZCommunity]
• IIPA Claims That South Africa’s Copyright Reform Bill Would Make The Country Ineligible For AGOA Benefits [Infojustice]
• Kenyan Banks Seek Regulatory Approval to Use Blockchain Tech [Bloomberg]
• Postdoctoral Research Fellowship: DST/NRF SARChI Research Chair: Intellectual Property, Innovation & Development [IP Unit]
• Judges Wanted: Strathmore Law School ICT Moot 2018 [Volunteer Here]

For more news stories and developments, please check out #ipkenya on twitter and feel free to share any other IP/ICT-related items that you may come across.

Have a great week-end!

#ipkenya Weekly Dozen: 10/08

• Kenya Guns for Top ICT Positions in Africa and Globally [Official]
• Strengthening Africa’s audiovisual sector: market intelligence is critical [WIPO Magazine]
• Technology transfer to transform agricultural production in Africa [African Development Bank]
• A decision-making tool for countries to implement the Multilateral System of Access and Benefit Sharing [Biodiversity International]
• ‘My President is a Pair of Buttocks’: the limits of online freedom of expression in Uganda [Oxford]
• Parallel imports remain a grey area for IP rights in East Africa [Captain Obvious]
• Trademark Infringement in Nigeria: What is ‘Use in the Course of Trade’? [Afro-IP]
• In case you missed it: You can now register copyright online in Kenya [KECOBO]
• Industrial Property Act Comes Into Effect [Namibia Economist]
• Scotch Whisky Association awarded a certification trademark in South Africa [the drinks business]
• Ethiopia becoming an industrial powerhouse and future ‘Wakanda’ [Asia Times]
• 10% of WIPO’s workforce comes from Africa [2018 Report]

For more news stories and developments, please check out #ipkenya on twitter and feel free to share any other IP/ICT-related items that you may come across.

Have a great week-end!

#ipkenya Weekly Dozen: 20/07

• Professor Calestous Juma Memorial Lecture: Public Policy Options for Science and Technology in Africa [Hashtag]
• CBD and ITPGRFA commit to enhanced cooperation on access and benefit-sharing of genetic resources [Official]
• Global Innovation Divide: Can Investment In Innovation Bridge The Gap? [IPW]
• Kenya is seizing the opportunity to protect individuals and their data [Privacy International]
• Tobacco Plain Packaging: An oncoming trademark dispute in South Africa? [UCT IP Unit]
• SAMPRA takes on SABC, IMPRA over needletime payout [MiA]
• Power, Profit and Sport: The Real Legacy of the Football World Cup [Nakueira]
• PAIPO – Concerns From A Brand Holder’s Perspective [africadotcom]
• South Africa: Software Developers Pasop/Beware/Qaphela/Hlokomela [A+ Bunch of Lawyers]
• Universal Music Launches Nigerian Division [Variety]
• Big Pharma and Predatory Pricing of Birth Control [Bhekisisa]
• Innovation Prize for Africa 2018: Investing in Inclusive Innovation Ecosystems [ICYMI]

For more news stories and developments, please check out #ipkenya on twitter and feel free to share any other intellectual property-related items that you may come across.

Have a great week-end!

#ipkenya Weekly Dozen: 29/06

• The Continental Free Trade Area: A game changer for Africa [The East African]
• Crunch Time at WIPO-IGC: A Last Attempt to Draft a New Genetic Resources Text? [ABS Canada]
• Zimbabwe Launches National IP Policy & Implementation Strategy [AllThingsIP]
• Ethiopia: Whose injera is it anyway? [Mail & Guardian]
• Strengthening African Science [Project Syndicate]
• South Africa: Marked improvements on the IP landscape [Lexology]
• Google is throwing its weight behind artificial intelligence for Africa [Quartz]
• Enabling intellectual property and innovation systems for South Africa’s development and competitiveness [Sibanda’s 2018 PhD Thesis]
• Nigeria: Food Security In Africa: Is Genetically Modified Technology A Pathway? [Leadership]
• Number of patents is a poor measure of innovation in ARIPO and Kenya [AfroIP]
• Emojis and intellectual property law [WIPO Magazine]
• Ten Years Later: Dismal Performance Scorecard for Kenya’s Anti-Counterfeit Agency [Captain Obvious]

For more news stories and developments, please check out #ipkenya on twitter and feel free to share any other intellectual property-related items that you may come across.

Have a great week-end!

Mobile Developer Claims Copyright over Songa Music App by Safaricom, Radio Africa

The recently reported High Court case of Evans Gikunda v. Patrick Quarcoo & Two Others [2018] was born out of a business deal gone bad. At the heart of this dispute is a music application (app) that the plaintiff (Gikunda) claims to have conceptualised, designed and developed between 2012 and 2016. However Gikunda joined the employ of the 2nd Defendant (Radio Africa Group Limited) in 2013 where the 1st Defendant (Quarcoo), the Chief Executive at Radio Africa, ‘persuaded Gikunda to partner with him to ensure that the product gets to market’.

According to Gikunda, Quarcoo proposed that that once Radio Africa’s Board of Directors sanctioned its participation in his app, they would share out the ownership of the app as follows: Radio Africa – 40%; Gikunda- 30%; Quarcoo- 20%; and the remaining 10% to a strategic partner. However, in mid-2016, Gikunda resigned from Radio Africa after which he alleges that Quarcoo and Radio Africa sold the app, without his knowledge, to the 3rd Defendant (Safaricom).

#ipkenya Weekly Dozen: 15/06

World Cup 2018 starts this week!

• ARIPO holds the Second Symposium on Copyright and Related Rights [Official]
• Tete Goat – First Geographical Indication of Mozambique [Inventa]
• Namibia introduces new Industrial Property Act [A+ Bunch of Lawyers]
• Competition Authority confirms Egypt’s right to air 22 World Cup games [Egypt Today]
• Should Africa let Silicon Valley in? [The Guardian]
• Kenya to publish draft data protection bill this month [Reuters]
• Rethinking Uganda’s State Brand Strategy Using Intangible Assets [Amani IP Network]
• Restriction on Parallel Imports Gets Red-Lighted By Competition Authority of Kenya [BD Africa]
• Stolen melodies: Copyright law in Africa [Deutsche Welle]
• Rwanda: Experts call for autonomous Intellectual Property office [The New Times]
• Kenya: Sharing books online kills creativity, it’s outright theft [One-sided coin]
• Anti-Counterfeit Agency Insults Intelligence of Stakeholders at ‘Consultative Forum’ on Proposed IP Law [Shameless Plug]

For more news stories and developments, please check out #ipkenya on twitter and feel free to share any other intellectual property-related items that you may come across.

Have a great week-end!

Kenya’s Computer Misuse and Cybercrimes Bill Signed into Law

On 16 May 2018, President Uhuru Kenyatta (pictured above) assented to the Computer Misuse and Cybercrimes Bill, 2018. The Bill was passed by the National Assembly on 26 April 2018. Readers of this blog will note that, unlike the previous Computer and Cybercrimes Bill, 2017 that was first tabled in Parliament, the Act now contains some new provisions relating to blockchain, mobile money, offences related to cybersquatting, electronic messages, revenge porn, identity theft and impersonation, as well as the newly created National Computer and Cybercrimes Coordination Committee. A copy of the Act is available here.

From an intellectual property (IP) perspective, the Act is significant for several reasons, including that it creates new offences and prescribes penalties related to cyber-infringements, it regulates jurisdiction, as well as the powers to investigate search and gain access to or seize items in relation to cybercrimes. It also regulates aspects of electronic evidence, relative to cybercrimes as well as aspects of international cooperation in respect to investigations of cybercrimes. Finally it creates several stringent obligations and requirements for service providers.

For Your Own Protection: Why Proposed Anti-Counterfeit Act Amendments Make Sense

The word ‘Disconnect’ (see caption image above) may be the title of the latest Kenyan blockbuster film but it also embodies the current raging debate over proposed changes to The Anti-Counterfeit Act No. 13 of 2008. In our previous blogposts here and here, we have largely dwelt on the demerits of the proposals contained in the Statute Law (Miscellaneous Amendments) Bill 2018, which if enacted, would radically affect intellectual property (IP) enforcement in Kenya, principally undertaken by Anti-Counterfeit Agency (ACA).

Meanwhile, some readers of this blog, who happen to be IP practitioners specialising in brand enforcement and anti-counterfeiting matters, have rightly pointed out that it is equally important to consider the merits of and benefits expected from the proposed changes to the Act if and when the omnibus Bill is enacted. In particular, this blogpost will focus on the proposals relating to offences and the ‘recordation’ requirements.

How A Typo Cost Safaricom the “OKOA STIMA” Trade Mark in Favour of Colour Planet

Recently, a leading newspaper published a story here stating that Safaricom Limited had obtained interlocutory orders against Colour Planet Limited stating that the latter was “forbidden from interfering with any contracts Safaricom has under the banner Okoa Stima, suggesting to any third party that Safaricom does not have the right to use the name Okoa Stima.” The rest of the story is filled with several contradictory and confusing facts regarding trade mark searches made, trade mark applications filed and trade mark registrations with respect to the Okoa Stima mark by both Safaricom and Colour Planet.

This blogpost is intended to set the record straight on the specific issue of the chronology of events at the Trade Mark Registry of Kenya Industrial Property Institute (KIPI) involving both Colour Planet and Safaricom between March 2015 and January 2016. For intellectual property (IP) practitioners, this post may also serve as a cautionary tale on the importance of care and caution when handling your clients’ matters pending before KIPI.