OPENING CEREMONIES

Moving on Up

Kicking off INTA’s 2021 Annual Meeting Virtual+, organizers took the opportunity to highlight the importance of promoting diversity, equity, and inclusion in the IP sector, as Alex Baldwin reports.

Meeting Co-Chairs Diane Lau, lead trademark paralegal at Facebook (US), and Lorenzo Litta, chief business officer at BrandIT (Switzerland), highlighted their reasoning for choosing the diversity, equity, and inclusion (DE&I)-focused “Building a Better Society Through Brands” as Monday’s educational track—the first of five daily tracks during the Annual Meeting Virtual+.

Mr. Litta said: “Brands can make a big difference in society and consumers expect brands to adhere to the core values of equity, inclusion, sustainability, and transparency. It is important for us to address these issues and include them in the way we do our jobs every day.”

During the Opening Ceremonies yesterday, INTA President Tiki Dare, vice president and associate general counsel, Oracle Corporation (US), centered her presentation on DE&I, a topic—and passion—that has been one of the key focal points of her 2021 presidency.

“By embracing diversity, by safeguarding equity and providing a level playing field for all, and by creating and nurturing an inclusive and safe environment for all, we build a more just and fair society.”
INTA President Tiki Dare, Oracle Corporation (US)

To colorfully bring the issue to life, she interviewed by videoconference several brand practitioners from around the world to share their stories of how embracing DE&I can help build up the next generation of leaders in the intellectual property (IP) sector.

Ms. Dare said: “By embracing diversity, by safeguarding equity and providing a level playing field for all, and by creating and nurturing an inclusive and safe environment for all, we build a more just and fair society—one in which every human has the opportunity to fulfil their potential.

“What does INTA and the global IP community stand to gain by investing in DE&I? It is the opportunity to bring into our community anyone who shares our passion, and that they are able to give all of themselves to this passion and unlock their own potential.”

“If you empower people with the ability to change their own community then it’s a full circle.”
M.S. Bharath, KRIA Law (India)

Association Impacts

One of the interviewees, M.S. Bharath, founder, KRIA Law (India), highlighted the work of an organization he volunteers with—India’s Increasing Diversity by Increasing Awareness (IDIA), a charitable trust helping to provide access to law education and mentoring.

He explained that IDIA is an organization created for students by the students on campuses across 25 states in the country. The students of IDIA reach out to the community to increase awareness about law as a tool for changing their lives, and then bring students into the law school system by raising funds to support their education, mentoring them, and giving them leadership roles.

He also referenced Sakkhi, an organization he founded which empowers transgender people, and which he set up when approached in his car by a transgender person who asked for help. The organization aims to provide transgender people with “employability and employment and bring them into the mainstream of society,” he said.

The logic of both these organizations is clear: “If you empower people with the ability to change their own community then it’s a full circle,” Mr. Bharath said. “In IDIA, kids from different walks of life are given the experience, knowledge, leadership, and mentoring to go back and elevate their communities.”

“In publicly traded companies, women are still not well-represented at a boardroom level ... We still have a way to go in improving diversity.”
Nicole Foga, Foga Daley (Jamaica)

Female Leaders

While gender disparity remains an issue in the IP sector worldwide, there are some jurisdictions where the number of women far exceed men in the legal workforce. However, even in those places, challenges still need to be addressed.

Giving her insights on the legal sector in Jamaica, Nicole Foga, partner at Foga Daley (Jamaica), said during her interview with Ms. Dare: “In publicly traded companies, women are still not well-represented at a boardroom level. A chairman or chief executive is not likely to be a woman. We still have a way to go in improving diversity.”

Jamaica performs relatively well in gender diversity in the legal sector, she observed, but there is still room for improvement. For example, the country has yet to appoint a female president of the Jamaican Court of Appeal, although this is “inevitable,” Ms. Foga said.

The situation is similar in Turkey where, despite underrepresentation in the workforce in general, women are prominent in the legal sector.

In sharing his experience with DE&I, Okan Çan, trademark and patent agent at Deris (Turkey), said: “Our perception is that gender equality in the legal market is quite balanced in terms of numbers. In IP, it might be more in favor of women.”

At his firm, for example, women comprise 87.5 percent of lawyers and attorneys, and 75 percent of partners.

“She has been a very positive influence on me, lending a hand not just to me, but to my contemporaries. A lot goes into finding people who believe in you.”
Uzoamaka Emerole, Adepetun, Caxton-Martins, Agbor & Segun (Nigeria)

The Power of Individuals

A core way of increasing diversity in a company’s ranks is by having visible diverse leaders who inspire and aid others in getting a leg up in their own careers.

Speaking about how mentors helped her get to where she is today, Uzoamaka Emerole, partner, Adepetun, Caxton-Martins, Agbor & Segun (Nigeria), said: “I started by admiring female lawyers from a distance and following their work. Eventually, I met a woman [Lara Kayode (O. Kayode & Co., Nigeria)], who I call a ‘big sister’ in the IP space.”

“She has been a very positive influence on me, lending a hand not just to me, but to my contemporaries. A lot goes into finding people who believe in you,” Ms. Emerole said.

Many firms offer in-house mentorship opportunities to help bolster their employees, regardless of their position or identity.

Mr. Çan’s firm offers career development mentorship programs to “everyone at the firm, feeding into the idea that everyone is included no matter their position or identity,” he said. “The goal of the program is to create self-awareness of someone’s potential and highlight ways in which they can improve.”

For LGBTQ2+ people, allies are crucial for helping them feel accepted and unimpeded in their career development, observed Michael Hawkins, partner, Noerr Alicante IP (Spain).

Offering his personal journey, he relayed that his “first experience coming out as gay in the workplace was through an ally. Twenty years ago there weren’t so many visible gay people in the professional environment who could I talk to about my personal life. Being able to talk to these allies made me realize that this didn’t change my work relationship with colleagues—in fact, it brought me closer to them.”

“There is huge potential if we let indigenous rights and IP co-exist.”
Lynell Tuffery Huria, Kāhui Legal (New Zealand)

Indigenous Efforts

While issues around gender, race, and sexuality often dominate the discussion of DE&I issues, providing opportunities for indigenous people is a core tenet of diversity across the world.

Aiding these communities can be mutually beneficial, New Zealand’s first Māori patent attorney, Lynell Tuffery Huria, partner, Kāhui Legal (New Zealand), told Ms. Dare.

“There is huge potential if we let indigenous rights and IP co-exist. It will unlock economic growth for these communities but will also benefit society by unlocking the knowledge that these communities hold that can help support the economy,” Ms. Tuffery Huria suggested.

DE&I efforts are instrumental to building new leaders and creating a diversity of thought and opinion that can help both individuals and the IP sector flourish, according to Ms. Dare.

She said: “By bringing DEI to IP and brands, we not only make these essential legal and marketing tools available to everyone who needs them, we do so in a way that ensures that anyone with a good idea can bring that idea to the market, protect it, and increase its value.”


Video courtesy of Envato Elements / amanaimages

2022 Annual Meeting Goes to Washington, D.C.

Wrapping up the Opening Ceremonies, INTA CEO Etienne Sanz de Acedo revealed that next year’s Annual Meeting will take place in Washington, D.C. (US), from Saturday, April 30 to Wednesday, May 4. Its format will consist of in-person and virtual offerings, and the in-person programming will take place at the Walter E. Washington Convention Center.

“While the current Annual Meeting Virtual+ is a full-fledged virtual event and inching back into ‘in person’ with limited-capacity mini-conferences, next year we’re in effect reversing the formula, with a full-fledged onsite event plus virtual components,” Mr. Sanz de Acedo said.

He added: “The 2022 Annual Meeting marks a return to our legacy as the world’s largest in-person gathering of brand professionals and affirms our strategic decision to combine the best of both worlds—in-person plus virtual—into our events moving forward.

“This hybrid formula works, advancing the Association into the future and accommodating different budgets, personal preferences, schedules, and other circumstances.”

Pre-registration for the 2022 Annual Meeting will run from November 18, at 9:00 am EST, through December 3, for INTA members who registered for the 2021 Annual Meeting during Premium Access and Early Access. For others, registration will open in January.

‘This Goes Out to Our Friends’
INTA members have produced a new music video that epitomizes the strength of the INTA community—and demonstrates yet another reason why members are looking forward to “coming home” at the just-announced 2022 Annual Meeting, an in-person plus virtual event that will take place from April 30 to May 4. “This Goes Out to Our Friends” is performed by The Opposition, a band composed of INTA members who have played together for several years at parties organized during the Annual Meeting and Leadership Meeting. The song was composed by Richard Dissmann of Bird & Bird (Germany), with contributions by Jason Vogel of Kilpatrick Townsend (US) and Joe Simone of SIPS (China).

Tuesday, November 16, 2021

Published by: