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22/02/2011 - Tokyo, Japan

Intellectual Property and Competition in a Globalised Economy (seminar)

This symposium of international experts attempted to elucidate what issues have global implications in the application of competition law to abusive practices of intellectual property rights (IPRs), what approaches emerging countries might take with regard to IPRs and competition and what principles should underlie the use of competition law in dealing with abuse of IPRs and anticompetitive IPR abuses.

Approaches to intellectual property rights (IPRs) and competition law enforcement differ considerably among developed countries. While these differences have been the subject of policy dialogues among these countries, IPRs and competition have also become issues of interest for developing countries. The TRIPS Agreement, in Article 40.2, refers to ‘licensing practices or conditions that may in particular cases constitute an abuse of intellectual property rights having an adverse effect on competition in the relevant market.’ The abuse of IPRs, which is analysed within the framework of IPR laws, is distinct from anti-competitive abuse, which is analysed within the framework of competition law. However, this TRIPS provision seems to include both.

Today, most WTO Members have implemented the TRIPS Agreement, albeit partially, and more than a hundred countries and regional organizations have adopted competition laws. What are the global issues involved in the application of competition law to IPR abuse that adversely affects competition?

Programme:
Coordinator and moderator: Professor Hiroko Yamane, National Graduate Institute for Policy Studies
13:00 - 13:05	Opening remarks by Professor Tatsuo Hatta, President of GRIPS
13:05 - 13:45	Global Issues relating to Competition and IPRs Speaker: Dr. Nuno Pires de Carvalho, Acting Director, Division of Intellectual Property and Competition Policy, WIPO
13:45 - 14:15	Economics of IPRs and competition Speaker: Professor Hiroshi Ohashi, Faculty of Economics, Tokyo University
14:15 - 14:55	China’s approach to IPRs and competition Speakers: Professor Dr. Xiaoye Wang, The Institute of Law, Chinese Academy of Social Sciences Director of Economic Law Department Mr. Isshin Shirasu (patent attorney): Chinese/Japanese translation *Professor Wang’s Chinese will be interpreted to Japanese, and then to English.
14:55 - 15:05	Q & A
15:05 - 15:15	Coffee break
15:15 - 16:15	Abuse of IPRs and anti-competitive abuse Speaker: Professor Hiroshi Kato, Faculty of Law, Nihon University Anti-competitive abuse: the EU Approach Speaker: Professor Ian Forrester, White and Case, Brussels
16:15 - 16:45	Japan's approach to IPRs and competition: Microsoft and Qualcomm cases Speaker: Professor Uesugi Akinori, Visiting professor, Graduate School of International Corporate Strategy, Hitotsubashi University, Former Secretary General of the Japanese Fair Trade Comission
16:45 - 17:00	IPRs and competition: From the viewpoint of investment and technology transfer Speaker: Mr. Tsuyoshi Kashimoto, Director for Intellectual Property, Multilateral Trade System Department Trade Policy Bureau Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry (METI)
17:00 - 17:10	Q & A
17: 10 - 17:20	Issues for further research Speaker: Professor Hiroko Yamane, National Graduate Institute for Policy Studies
17:20 - 17:25	Closing remarks by Mr. Julien Guerrier, General Manager, EU-Japan Centre for Industrial Cooperation
17:25 - 18:15	Networking Drinks

About the speakers

Dr. Nuno Pires de Carvalho
Dr. Nuno Pires de Carvalho, a Portuguese citizen, is the Acting Director of the Intellectual Property and Competition Policy Division, World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO). He has been in the WIPO Secretariat since 1999. He has worked in different areas of the WIPO Secretariat, including traditional knowledge and genetic resources and legislative assistance to developing countries. Previously he was counselor at the Intellectual Property Division of the World Trade Organization (WTO), between 1996 and 1999. Dr. Carvalho was for twenty years (1976-1995) the in-house attorney in charge of industrial property matters of a Nippo-Brazilian steel company, USIMINAS, based in Belo Horizonte, Minas Gerais, Brazil. He holds Master and Doctorate Degrees in Law from the Federal University of Minas Gerais, Brazil, and the Washington University in St. Louis, Missouri, United States. He is the author of many articles on industrial property, the most recent being From the Shaman’s Hut to the Patent Office: In Search of a TRIPS-Consistent Requirement to Disclose the Origin of Genetic Resources and Prior Informed Consent, 17 Wash. U. J.L. & Pol’y 111 (2005) and The Theorem of the Social Value of Patented Inventions and the Happiness Machine Patent Syndrome – Why society lets fundamental patents to be intensely attacked, Rev. Eletr. do IBPI no. 3, Dec. 2010, available at www.ibpibrasil.org. He has also authored a number of books on industrial property, such as The TRIPS Regime of Patent Rights, 3rd ed., Kluwer Law, 2010, and the TRIPS Regime of Trademarks and Designs, 2nd ed., Kluwer Law, 2010, as well as on antitrust law, such as Mergers and Acquisitions under Brazilian Law, Res. Trib., 1995 [in Portuguese] and The Trips Regime of Antitrust and Undisclosed Information, Kluwer Law, 2008.

Professor Hiroshi Ohashi
Professor Hiroshi Ohashi is associate professor at Graduate School of Economics at the University of Tokyo. His areas of research include empirical industrial organization, competition policy and science and technology policy. Dr. Ohashi previously taught at Sauder School of Business, University of British Columbia, Canada, and held a visiting professorship in Ludwig-Maximilians-Universitat Munchen, Germany. He has also served a chief researcher at Competition Policy Research Center at Japan Fair Trade Commission, a faculty fellow at the Research Institute of Economy, Trade & Industry, and a head research officer at the National Institute of Science and Technology Policy in the MEXT. Dr. Ohashi earned an Excellent Young Economist Award from the European Association for Research in Industrial Economics in 2001, and the first Miyazawa Kenichi Award from Japan’s Fair Trade Association in 2010. He is an author of many academic refereed journal articles including the Journal of Industrial Economics, Review of Industrial Organization and Journal of Economics and Management Strategy. He holds a Ph.D. in Economics from Northwestern University, and a M.A. and B.A. from University of Tokyo.

Professor Dr. Xiaoye Wang
Professor, The Institute of Law, Chinese Academy of Social Sciences (CASS). Director of Economic Law Department LL.M. from Remin University, a Doctor Juris degree from University Hamburg. advisor of the Drafting Committee of China’s Antimonoply Law, Vice President of National Association for Economic Law of China Max Planck Institute for Intellectual Property.　 Since 1984, she has been working at the CASS. As visiting scholar she spent a year at Max-Planck Institute for Comparative Intellectual Property and Competition Law, and a year at Max-Planck Institute for Comparative Social Law in Munich. In 2004, she was invited to the US by the Antitrust Division of the Department of Justice. In 2005, she was invited to the European Union Visitors Program, and awarded a Fulbright Scholarship to spend 10 months at the Chicago-Kent College of Law. Prof. Wang works in the areas of economic law, international economic law, and focuses on competition law. She is the author and editor of 16 books including: Monopoly and Competition in the Chinese Economy, A Conception for Merger Control in China in View of the American and German Experiences (J.C.B.Mohr,1993); Monopoly Problem in the Merger of Enterprises (Law Press,1996); Competition Law of European Community (China’s Legal Publishing House,2001); Competition Law (Social Sciences Academic Press, 2007) and On Chinese Anti-Monopoly Law(Intellectual Property Publishing House，2008 ). She is also the author of over 200 papers published in Chinese, German and English. Prof. Wang has served as Vice President of National Association for Economic Law of China, the head of the Consultant Committee for WTO Trade and Competition Policy of MOFCOM, and member of the Expert Advisory Board for Anti-Monopoly Legislation of the State Council and the National People’s Congress（NPC）. She was honored to lecture on competition law for the Standing Committee of the Ninth and Tenth NPC of P.R. China. Prof. Wang is founding member of Academic Society for Competition Law (ASCOLA), Asia Competition Forum （ACF）, member of International Advisory Board of CUTS C-CIER, and member of International Advisory Board of American Antitrust Institute(AAI). She lectured on Chinese competition law at ABA, IBA, IPBA, ACF, Harvard University, Columbia University, Washington University (St.Louis), New York University, KFTC, Chatham House, LIDC, IDRC and many other institutions.

Professor Hiroshi Kato
Professor, 　Faculty of Law, Nihon University since 2009. BA(1988), MA(1990) in Pharmacology, University of Tokyo; Patent Examiner, Japan Patent Office (1990-2004, 2007-2008); Harvard University (1997); Associate Professor, National Graduate Institute for Policy Studies (2005-2007); PhD Public Policy, Tohoku University (2008).

Professor Ian Forrester
Professor Ian Forrester practises European law with lawyers from 8 jurisdictions in the Brussels office of White & Case. He was admitted to the Faculty of Advocates (the Scottish Bar) in 1972, the New York State Bar in 1977, and the English Bar in 1996 and has participated in many cases before the European Courts, the European Commission and national competition agencies. He represented the European Commission before the European Courts in the Magill case about refusals to license by dominant companies, and UEFA in the Bosman case about professional football. He specialises in the fields of competition, trade, sport, broadcasting and pharmaceutical regulation, having acted in contentious proceedings for the BBC, Canon, Du Pont, GlaxoSmithKline, Microsoft, Pfizer, Toshiba, Toyota and other leading companies. His numerous articles on competition law include an annual survey of EC competition law developments in the Oxford Yearbook of European Law, 1981 to date. He was appointed Queen’s Counsel in 1988, and Visiting Professor (1991) then Honorary Professor and Honorary Doctor of Laws (2009) at Glasgow University.

Professor Uesugi Akinori
Visiting professor, Graduate School of International Corporate Strategy, Hitotsubashi University; He served as a Secretary General at the Japanese Fair Trade Commission. (2003-2006) where he started his career in 1970.　Member of the Executive Council, Competition Forum (Tokyo). He is a senior consultant at Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer since July 2006.

Mr. Tsuyoshi Kashimoto
Director for Intellectual Property, Multilateral Trade System Department Trade Policy Bureau Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry (METI) BA(1991), MA(1993) in Science and Technology, Keio University; Patent Examiner, Deputy Director of Economic Partnership Agreement, and Appeal Examiner, Japan Patent Office (1993-2010).

Mr. Isshin Shirasu (Born in Shanghai)
EDUCATION: MA (Bioscience) Tokyo University of Technology Registered as Japanese Patent Attorney (2002), Member of Japan Bio-Industry Association. Expertise: prosecutions on new chemical entities, pharmaceuticals, dosage forms, DNAs, proteins, antibodies, biologicals, softwares, and patent litigations. Languages: Japanese, Chinese, English

Professor Hiroko Yamane
Professor of Law at the National Graduate Institute for Policy Studies. She has taught trade law, competition and intellectual property rights at various Universities in Japan, the UK and France. Her recent publications include Interpreting TRIPS, Hart Publishing, Oxford, UK (March 2011). Globalization of Intellectual Property: TRIPS and Access to Medicines, Iwanami Publishing Co. (2007 in Japanese); Kidana, Nakagawa and Yamane (eds.); International Commercial Law, Horitsubunkasha, Kyoto (2006 in Japanese); Merger Control: U.S. and EU Cases and their Implications for Japan, NTT Publication (2002 in Japanese).

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