Program

In this fireside chat, we dive into how a small Irish business unexpectedly found itself toe-to-toe with one of the world’s most powerful brands. Pat McDonagh, founder of SUPERMAC’s, will share how his company grew, how a seemingly routine Trade Mark filing escalated into headlines, and what it’s like to win a battle you never expected to fight. Expect strategic insights, war stories, and a few laughs about what can happen when a global giant underestimates the little guy…

Abstract

Artificial intelligence is redefining the landscape of intellectual property practice—streamlining analysis, accelerating commercialization, and transforming the skill sets required of IP professionals. As technology advances, questions arise about how expertise, accreditation, and credibility will evolve in this new environment.
AI vs. the IP Professional: Adapting Expertise and Credibility in the Age of Change will bring together experienced practitioners and thought leaders from across regions to explore how LES members and Certified Licensing Professionals (CLPs) can adapt and thrive amid constant technological and economic changes.

The panel will address how AI is influencing the practice of IP licensing, valuation, and strategy; the role of continuous learning and global credentials in sustaining professional standards; and the enduring human qualities – judgment, creativity, and ethical reasoning that ensure lasting value in an AI-driven world. Participants will leave with practical insights on navigating professional development, accreditation, and cross-border collaboration within the dynamic global LES community.

Panel Description

As artificial intelligence reshapes the IP landscape, what does it mean to stay credible, accredited, and relevant? This global panel brings together LES leaders and Certified Licensing Professionals across sectors to discuss how AI is transforming expertise, career development, and professional standards, and how IP practitioners can adapt, collaborate, and lead in an era of constant change.

Standard-essential patents occupy much of the international debate on licensing, yet in many technology-driven industries the most commercially decisive assets are non-SEP: implementation patents, performance and security improvements, user-experience features, system, analytics and monetization tools. This session will show how technology owners in sectors such as semiconductors, connected medical devices, OTT/streaming, MVPDs and social media platforms structure international licensing for precisely these non-standardized layers.

The panel will bring together four complementary perspectives across the IP value-creation lifecycle: (i) a valuation and IP-transactions specialist explaining how to make non-SEP assets “legible” to the market and price them when there is no FRAND anchor; (ii) a business/licensing perspective on how to approach companies that are using or plan to use different technologies in different verticals; (iii) packaging and tailoring functionalities so they can be licensed for distinct uses and territories; and (iv) a cross-border legal/enforcement perspective on how courts and dispute-resolution mechanisms are integrated into licensing strategies without derailing commercialization. Together, they will address the issue of monetization–dispute–negotiation junction, as well as pricing, and show how to keep licensing aligned with R&D remuneration..

For this purpose, this panel brings members experiences in several aspects of the lifecycle of licensing, from pricing / valuation, to packaging and monetizing portfolios, as well as high impact litigation.

This proposal fits “INNOVATION TO IMPACT: IP as an International Growth Engine” because non-SEP licensing is often the mechanism that actually returns investment to innovators and enables funding to flow to the next cycle. This is relevant especially where standards do not cover the differentiating technology. This is a discussion necessary to International Growth Engine and it will be useful to LES members who negotiate outside classic standards environments and need practical models for royalty setting, fields of use, and territorial roll-outs.

This session will be moderated by Sam Wiley.

Patent and data pools can advance life sciences where technologies are interdependent and transaction costs are high, but they are not universal solutions. This session distills when pooling works, why several life sciences pool efforts stalled, and how to structure compliant, effective models.

We begin with devices and connected care. Connectivity SEPs and non SEPs are moving into medical devices, as illustrated by recent licensing campaigns and litigation against connected respiratory and remote monitoring products. With connected healthcare expanding rapidly, devices routinely embed 4G/5G, Wi Fi, Bluetooth, and video codecs, triggering multiple patent stacks. Targeted pools or licensing platforms, mixing SEP and non SEP connectivity with device specific complements, can cut stacking, speed deals, and reduce litigation risk while preserving downstream competition.

Next, we address data as an input. “Data pools” or collectives for clinical genomic and real world evidence data can improve access and interoperability if governed to avoid anticompetitive information exchange, aggregation/anonymization, standardized and transparent access criteria, and firewalls for competitively sensitive data. We frame compliance under U.S. guidance and the EU’s revised Technology Transfer Block Exemption Regulation and Horizontal Guidelines, highlighting safe harbors (market share thresholds, independent expert review, open and nondiscriminatory access) and hardcore restrictions to avoid. We close with practical metrics: time to deal, coverage of essentials, royalty stacking, and patient access.

Finally, we deal with past attempts to apply patent pools in the biological world, such as in diagnostic correlation tests. These tests were ripe for biotech patent pools: heterogeneous assays, fragmented rights, and difficulty defining “essential” patents without credible medical standards. We identify features that would translate from electronics to biotech and those that would not. For example, include in a biotech pool only valid, essential and complementary patents; use independent essentiality assessments; license on a non exclusive, nondiscriminatory basis with FRAND style terms; and employ narrow grant backs. Medically driven reference panels (for example, consensus mutation sets and WHO reference materials) can anchor scope, reduce holdout risk, and clarify essentiality. Yet attempts at classical patent pools in the biological space have failed, primarily due to a lack of interdependency and to a strong culture of exclusivity.

While US jurisprudence on not making injunctions automatic (eBay, Sup Ct 2006) tempers holdout leverage and supports cooperative licensing, rulings on the lack of patent eligibility for diagnostic correlations (Mayo v Prometheus, S. Ct. 2012) and of isolated gene patents (AMP v Myriad, St Ct 2013) have made the need for diagnostic patent pools less critical.

This session will be moderated by Jayde Wood

This workshop presents a live, scripted mock negotiation between counsel for a national food-and-beverage franchisor and counsel for a prospective multi-unit franchisee. Designed for an international audience of legal professionals advising brands, investors, and operators, the session dissects the legal, commercial, and operational levers that drive outcomes in franchise deals. Participants will observe how experienced practitioners translate client objectives into contract language, manage risk allocation, and navigate market norms versus aggressive positions across the franchise lifecycle.

The session will prioritize core negotiation issues unique to franchising, how to deploy pragmatic strategies for bridging gaps between brand standards and operator autonomy, and drafting and revising key provisions with improved precision. Practical issue-spotting, effective advocacy, and the use of playbooks and term sheets to structure negotiations and manage concessions will be demonstrated.

The workshop will alternate between negotiation and brief “bench commentary” to make explicit the legal theories, case law sensitivities, regulator expectations, and commercial trade-offs animating each move at the table. The fact pattern is tailored to a fast-casual brand expanding through multi-unit area development in urban and suburban trade areas, with dine-in, takeout, and third-party delivery channels.
The session will demonstrate how counsel frames, defends, and trades some key issues, focusing on market positions, risk allocation, and drafting techniques, such as:

• Territory, Development Rights, and Performance: Scope of exclusive/protected areas, development schedules, unit-opening milestones, cure mechanics, and step-in rights for missed KPIs.
• Fees and Financial Terms: Initial fees, royalty structures (percentage of gross sales, floors/ceilings), marketing fund contributions, technology fees, and pass-throughs; audit rights and underreporting remedies.
• Supply Chain and Approved Vendors: Exclusive purchasing obligations, brand protection in ingredient specifications, alternative supplier approvals, continuity planning, product recalls, and cost inflation mechanisms.
• Quality Control and Brand Standards: Menu innovation approvals, limited-time offers, brand refresh/remodel obligations, capex allocations, and timing; inspections, cure, and default protocols.
• Technology and Data: POS requirements, loyalty programs, data ownership and usage, privacy/security compliance, incident response, integrations, and vendor back-to-backs.
• IP, Trademarks, and Digital Assets: Licensed marks, trade dress, packaging, proprietary recipes/processes, and rules for co-branding or ghost-kitchen deployments.
• ESG, Health, and Food Safety: Sustainability packaging mandates, nutritional disclosures, food safety protocols, inspections, and incident allocation.
• Insurance and Indemnities: Required coverages, deductibles/self-insured retentions, additional insured status, and tender/cooperation obligations.
• Defaults, Remedies, and Termination: Monetized cure provisions, step-in and operational control, partial terminations, post-termination covenants, de-branding, and liquidated damages.
• Dispute Resolution and Governing Law: Mediation/arbitration frameworks, venue, consolidation, injunctive relief carve-outs, and enforcement considerations in multi-state contexts.

The panel will comprise speakers from various jurisdictions to enable an international perspective to be presented. While the scenario may be in the food and beverage industry, the demonstration will be equally applicable to other franchising sectors.

This session will be moderated by Lionel Tan.

The session could cover the following issues:

Why:

• Discuss potential advantages of arbitration as opposed to court litigation by using the example of (i) litigating a patent dispute before the UPC, and (ii) litigating a patent licensing dispute before an agreed state court (e.g. as regards speed, confidentiality, enforcement, risk of multi-jurisdictional litigation, qualification of decision-makers)
• Discuss relevance of arbitration in the field of SEP/FRAND disputes

How:

• Discuss options to tailor arbitral process to the needs of the dispute at hand and to ensure a cost-efficient and speedy resolution (e.g., expedited arbitration, sole vs. three-member panel, arb-med-arb mechanism, agreed limits to document discovery, remote or hybrid hearings)

Where:

• Discuss the UPC’s Patent Mediation and Arbitration Centre (PMAC) as a possible arbitration service provider: A look at the PMAC arbitration rules, at the interaction with the UPC (e.g., as regards consent awards), at the arbitrator selection process, and a comparison to other arbitration service providers (such as WIPO, ICC, LCIA), e.g., as regards arbitrator selection/qualification (with a view to patent-related disputes), and costs
• Explain the importance of the seat of arbitration (e.g. as regards arbitrability, options to challenge an arbitral award before states and impact on overall duration and cost of dispute resolution process), e.g. by using the example of the two frequently chosen seats London and Geneva for comparison.

By Whom:

• Discuss desired arbitrator qualifications for patent and licensing disputes and relevance of arbitrator selection process

This session will be moderated by Philipp Groz.

How do licensing models evolve as innovation moves from university research to scalable start-ups, and how do national laws shape that journey? What mechanisms unlock disruptive technologies and enable start-ups and spin-offs to enter the market and license their innovations? And how can licensing itself function as a form of equity or investment promotion?

These are the central questions of the proposed session. This roundtable brings together experts from Italy, Brazil, Ireland and Chile, to examine how legal frameworks and institutional practices influence technology commercialization and start-up investment.

In Europe, universities have long been key players in transferring intellectual property to spin-offs and industry partners. A recent legislative reform in Italy abolished the traditional professor’s privilege, shifting ownership of inventions from individual researchers to universities. This reform raises new questions about inventor incentives, revenue-sharing, and contractual autonomy in licensing negotiations.

Ireland provides a contrasting, system-level perspective: a nationally coordinated “joined-up innovation” model aligns policy, funding, and standardized IP frameworks through Knowledge Transfer Ireland and professional networks such as IKTA. This integrated approach aims to reduce transaction friction, increase investment readiness, and accelerate licensing and spin-out creation, offering a benchmark for how coherent governance can amplify the impact of IP commercialization.

In Chile, a new Technology and Knowledge Transfer Bill under discussion aims to strengthen the national innovation ecosystem by clarifying IP ownership from publicly funded research and allowing universities to play a more active role in spin-offs. Challenges persist, however: limited private investment, modest licensing revenues, and the ongoing need to align academic and commercial interests.

Brazil has pioneered technology sandboxes: regulatory environments that allow start-ups to test new technologies under controlled conditions. These sandboxes create valuable licensing opportunities and attract investment for approved technologies but also pose legal challenges, including confidentiality risks, discrimination in access, and potential “”greenwashing”” if regulatory approval is misinterpreted as a quality label.

By comparing these diverse systems, this roundtable invites participants to exchange experiences and practical insights on how IP ownership and licensing structures – whether in university tech transfer or innovative regulatory environments – serve as growth engines, turning research into market impact, investment, and innovation.

Artificial Intelligence (AI) is reshaping the global innovation landscape, accelerating discovery and product development across every sector—from life sciences to creative industries. Yet this rapid evolution challenges the very foundations of intellectual property systems and contractual frameworks that were designed for a pre-algorithmic world.

This session will explore how intellectual property rights can both enable and constrain AI-driven innovation, with a specific focus on the complexities arising in licensing agreements. As AI systems increasingly generate creative outputs, inventions, and data-driven insights, questions emerge over ownership, authorship, and enforceability of data and IP rights. At the same time, both licensors and licensees must navigate unprecedented contractual risks:

• How should rights in AI-generated works be allocated?
• What warranties and liabilities apply when training data are scraped or reused?
• How can licensing models evolve to balance transparency, compliance, and commercial scalability?

Bringing together experts from Europe, the United States, and Asia, this roundtable will offer a comparative analysis of current regulatory and contractual approaches, company from aerospace sector will bring its experience. The European Union’s initiatives on AI governance and copyright exceptions will be contrasted with the more market-driven frameworks of the U.S. and the evolving innovation ecosystems in key Asian jurisdictions.

Participants will gain practical insights into how licensing strategies can be structured to harness AI technologies responsibly, ensuring that innovation translates into impact while safeguarding rights and fostering collaboration among developers, data providers, and end users.

The discussion will also touch on the contentious issue of data scraping, examining when it constitutes legitimate use versus infringement and how emerging case law is shaping global practice.

By combining legal, commercial, and policy perspectives, this session aims to foster a forward-looking dialogue on how IP systems and licensing models must adapt to sustain innovation in the era of intelligent technologies—where the engines of growth are as much algorithmic as they are human.

LESI Dublin – What better place to discuss distillation! Although this session will discuss distillation of AI models and other matters relating to the cross-section of AI, copyright and Trade Secrets.

As the legal sector struggles to keep pace with the rapid developments in AI new challenges arise that challenge the ability to protect value creation. In January 2025 the launch of DeepSeek sent shock-waves through the industry first grabbing attention on the size and development cost of training; but then from accusations of obtaining their technology from OpenAI in an unauthorised manner through a technique known as “distillation”.

Whether distillation is a legitimate technical process or mass data misappropriation is a key discussion point. The AI industry actively argues its position on copyright, claiming that training AI models on copyrighted material without a license is fair use.

In light of this the session will particularly focus on the issues around the available mechanisms to protect, and consider whether it is hypocrisy to invoke fair use to defend your own behaviour, while invoking trade secret and contract law to protect your own models against replication or distillation; or is it sound strategy?

• Whether the outputs of AI models qualify as creative expression and hence qualify for copyright protection
• Where the discussion on fair use of copyright hits meets trade secret violation
• The possibility of non-IP approaches such as violation of contracts, user agreements, or Terms of Service
• Contractual arrangements and the principle of good faith in business interactions

The roundtable will include industry (AI developer), academia, IP practitioner(s) and legal expert(s).

The licensing of IPRs and transfer technology agreements in general (TTA) help to disseminate new technology, bring new competitors on to the market and increase the reward for innovation. According to the findings of EPO and EUIPO in a recent joint research study (Industry-level analysis report, fourth edition October 2022), IPR-intensive industries make an important contribution to the functioning of the EU’s internal market as they account for more than 75% of intra-EU trade.

In this scenario the Commission’s regulation setting out the block exemption from the prohibition of anti-competitive agreements and its guidelines play an important role in design a set of transparent and predictable rules which are used by businesses and enterprises to determine as accurately as possible, a tolerable cost, which transfer technology agreements are permissible since the procompetitive effects generated to the benefit of consumers outweigh the negative effects on competition caused by some restrictions.

On 11 September 2025, the Commission published for comments drafts of the revised Technology Transfer Block Exemption Regulation (TTBER) and Technology Transfer Guidelines which should replace current block exemption regime that will expire on 30 April 2026. LES France, LES Germany and LES Italy took part to the public consultation submitting their comments and suggestions.

This roundtable will explain the changes in the new TTBER and the answers provided or view points on the changes suggested highlighted by LES national chapters with the goal to identify efficient and practical ways to deal with difficulties posed by licensing of SEPs, LNGs, AI/data licensing agreements and out of court settlements, in various technical fields, particularly in emerging technology sectors such as IoT and systems increasingly based on AI & data-driven innovations.

This session will discuss initiatives and proposals aimed at incentives for negotiating licensing outcomes between licensees and licensors of standard essential patents. This roundtable will discuss efforts ongoing at Standards Development Organizations, ADR solutions, WIPO’s efforts regarding SEP licensing, etc.

This Session is meant to be the final step of a three webinars series organised by the LESI YMC. Coordinated by the Chair of YMC, the regional Vice-Chairs are organising three webinars, one per region. The webinars are meant to be held in the first quarter 2026, before the Annual Conference.

Artificial Intelligence is transforming the innovation landscape, raising unprecedented questions for intellectual property systems worldwide.

Following a three-part webinar series spanning Europe, APAC, and America, this roundtable will synthesize key insights and debates on how AI is reshaping IP law, policy, and practice.

The session will address the evolving regulatory frameworks for AI (including the EU AI Act, China’s AI regulation, and US jurisprudence), the challenges of copyright and inventorship for AI-generated works, and the practical risks and opportunities for IP professionals, innovators, and institutions. Drawing on the diverse expertise of speakers from different regions, the discussion will highlight both convergences and divergences in global approaches, with a focus on actionable guidance for practitioners.

The project will also feature a “Demo Day” during a webinar, showcasing how leading AI tools are being deployed in IP management, prosecution, and enforcement, and what this means for the future of the profession.

Key Legal Questions / Discussion Points for the roundtable:

• How are different jurisdictions (EU, US, China, APAC) regulating AI, and what are the implications for IP protection and enforcement?
• Who is the author or inventor when AI generates works or inventions? What are the risks and best practices for claiming and managing rights?
• How can IP professionals and organizations mitigate risks when using AI tools for generating or managing IP assets?
• What practical lessons can be drawn from real-world AI applications in IP (as demonstrated in the webinar “Demo Day”)?
• How can international collaboration and harmonization be fostered in the rapidly evolving AI/IP landscape?

The roundtable will bring the most important experiences, learnings and outcomes from the three webinars and present them to the physical audience of Dublin.

This session directly addresses “AI, Data & Software” and “IP Strategy, Enforcement & Global Policy” by exploring how AI-driven innovation challenges and advances the global IP system. It will provide attendees with a comparative, practice-oriented understanding of the opportunities and pitfalls at the AI/IP frontier.

The proposed session aims to explore the financial dimensions of intellectual property litigation – an often underestimated but crucial factor shaping enforcement strategies, settlement dynamics, and corporate decision-making. The discussion will focus on how the costs, funding models, and damages recovery mechanisms influence not only the course of litigation but also the broader economic wellbeing and strategic positioning of rights holders.

Particular attention will be given to differences between small or growing enterprises and large, established corporations, and how each of them perceives and manages the financial risks and potential gains of pursuing litigation. The session will address both practical and conceptual questions related to the economic viability of enforcement, such as:

• Damages practice: How straightforward is it to prove and quantify damages in IP cases? What evidentiary standards and economic methodologies are developing in national courts and before the Unified Patent Court (UPC)?
• Costs recovery: What challenges arise in the practical implementation of cost-shifting rules, and how do they influence litigation strategy and settlement negotiations?
• Funding and investment: Is litigation always a cost, or can it also serve as an investment increasing the value of a company and its IP portfolio? How do successful judgments affect the market valuation of IP-centered enterprises?
• Corporate governance and finance: How can legal teams effectively communicate litigation risks and opportunities to investors, boards, and financial stakeholders, especially when pursuing objectives beyond injunctive relief?

The discussion will also consider cross-border implications, including how the enforcement of damages and costs decisions across jurisdictions (notably within the UPC system) may reshape the financial calculus of litigating in Europe.

By combining legal, financial, and strategic perspectives, the roundtable will invite both practitioners and in-house counsel to rethink the traditional view of litigation as a purely defensive cost, and to explore how enforcement can function as a driver of corporate value and innovation strategy.

As global M&A activity increasingly targets data-driven and technology-intensive sectors, intangible assets have become central to corporate valuation and regulatory scrutiny. The betting and gaming industry provides a vivid example of how intellectual property (IP), compliance, and business strategy intersect to shape high-stakes transactions with a special focus on betting industry.

This roundtable will discuss how comprehensive intangible assets due diligence are structured to a transaction’s success. The discussion will highlight broader lessons for M&A transactions in regulated digital industries, including:

• The growing weight of intangible assets in corporate valuation and deal strategy.
• How intangible due diligence mitigates regulatory and compliance risks, particularly those linked to licensing, data protection, and advertising restrictions.
• Emerging challenges in protecting software, interactive content, and generative AI across jurisdictions.
• The importance of portfolio management strategies designed for scalability and international expansion.

Ultimately, this session will demonstrate how robust intangible management and cross-functional legal innovation can unlock international growth opportunities in newly regulated markets. It aligns with the LESI 2026 theme, “Innovation to Impact: IP as an International Growth Engine,” by showing that intellectual property is not merely a protective tool, but a catalyst for market entry, regulatory compliance, and sustainable business transformation.

In today’s global and highly digitized marketplace, trademark enforcement must extend far beyond official registers. From social media and app stores to e-commerce platforms and lookalike websites, unauthorized uses, counterfeits, and brand dilution have become more elusive—and more damaging.
Yet many trademark holders and IP professionals face key challenges:

• Where to begin with monitoring in the vast digital space
• How to set up cost-effective scanning workflows
• How to detect and triage false positives
• How to coordinate effective, cross-jurisdictional responses
  This interactive session offers practical training, real-time demos, and peer learning. Participants will be guided through:
• A live scan of a sample brand using accessible tools and platforms
• Techniques for domain crawling, image recognition, social listening, and use of platform takedown features
• A hands-on group exercise to simulate detection and response to online infringements
• A structured decision tree of enforcement actions (from platform complaints to litigation)

This roundtable will also address real-world complications, such as:

• Lookalike domains and typosquatting
• User-generated content (UGC) on platforms
• Jurisdictional barriers to enforcement
• Evidence collection for litigation

Attendees will leave with:

• A practical checklist for digital trademark monitoring
• A template monitoring plan adaptable to their organization
• Increased confidence in tackling online infringement globally

Target Audience

• Trademark attorneys
• In-house IP counsel
• Brand protection teams
• SMEs
• IP enforcement professionals
• Legal tech/monitoring consultants

How does the type of innovation relate to a company’s market position and its key value discipline? How does company culture influence the dynamics of innovation? The concept of key value disciplines was developed by Treacy & Wiersema through analyzing market leaders. In their work Treacy & Wiersema identified three traits or disciplines as the key drivers for value delivered. One needs to perform at all three, but one can only excel in one. This paradigm approach provides a valuable tool for gaining insight in the character, i.e. the main driver of innovation that a company depends on. But it also helps in understanding how company culture influences evaluation of innovations. And how this may cause misalignment of a developing IP portfolio and the future of a company.

The term “Value driven innovation” has been advocated to bring into focus the value proposition when pursuing innovation and relevant IP. As a way of defining this approach, it is usually contrasted with “Technology driven innovation”. This distinction is too simple, as if Technology driven innovation does not have its own value proposition. In addition, this alleged contrasting is blind to another driver of innovation: operational performance.

In product differentiation the culture may be dominated by engineering. Innovation will be mainly inhouse as the main issues are implicit to the technology. In customer responsiveness the culture may be dominated by marketing: segmenting & targeting, seeking out customers’ pain points. Whether a solution is then developed inhouse or sourced in is of less interest, as long as it will become included in the next generation of products. In operational performance driven innovation, either sales or logistics may be dominant. Innovation will be mainly inhouse, foremostly dedicated to inhouse processes, assembly and manufacturing.

A dominant culture does not just relate to people or functions, but also to targets and performance indicators: the whole paradigm that drives judgements and decisions. And this is what will make assessing innovations and resulting inventions challenging.

The session embodies the LESI 2026 theme, “Innovation to Impact: IP as an International Growth Engine,” by showing that true impact emerges when diverse perspectives collide — when scientists, lawyers, entrepreneurs and investors debate how intellectual property can accelerate sustainability, competitiveness, and global growth.

The Chemicals, Environment, Engineering and Materials (CEEM) industries sit at the epicentre of the global transition toward a sustainable economy. Yet the path from innovation to impact is anything but straightforward. From laboratory breakthroughs and IP protection to market deployment and licensing models, the way ideas move from discovery to delivery determines who benefits, who invests, and how fast the world can change.

This high-energy roundtable brings together members of the CEEM Industry Advisory Board for a sequence of intense, provocative debates that challenge the perspectives on how intellectual property, policy and market forces shape international growth, and provide multifaceted perspective on IP as a growth engine.

Debate questions and positions:

1. “Innovation Happens in the Lab” vs “Innovation Happens in the Market”
Do scientific breakthroughs or commercial adoption truly drive change? Side A: “Without labs and scientists, there would be no ideas to bring to market – this is where innovation happens.”
Side B: “Without markets and customers, even the best lab ideas would die — real innovation happens when products succeed.”

2. “Licensing is an Art” vs “Licensing is a Science”
Are relationships and instinct the heart of IP, or do data and valuation models rule?
Side A: “It’s all about negotiation, relationships, gut instinct — licensing is human magic.”
Side B: “Metrics, valuation models, portfolio management — licensing is rigorous, analytical, and precise.”

3. “Patents Should Be Forever” vs “Patents Should Be Shorter”
How long should exclusivity last in fast-moving, yet investment intense, sustainability markets?
Side A: “20 years is the blink of an eye — patent terms should last longer to reward and facilitate the required investments.”
Side B: “20 years is an eternity — patent terms should be shorter to accelerate progress because of the extreme urgency.”

4. “Humans vs AI: Who Will Be the Better Innovator?”
Will creativity or computation power the next decade of CEEM breakthroughs?
Side A: “Human creativity, intuition, and ethics can never be replaced — AI will always be the tool, never the driver.”
Side B: “AI and machine learning are the future invention engines — humans will only prompt and it is the AI who will discover the connections and the innovations.”

5. “Patents Are an Outdated Framework” vs “Patents Remain a Necessary incentive to Drive Innovation”
Are patents still economically viable in a world that rewards speed and secrecy?
Side A: “Patents belong to the industrial age — in today’s fast-moving world, they slow innovation instead of fuelling it.”
Side B: “Without patents, there would be no fuel in the innovation engine — they remain the backbone of the heavy investments needed.”

Together, these “IP Sparks” will expose the real tensions driving CEEM innovation — speed vs safety, openness vs exclusivity, human creativity vs machine precision.

While socially responsible licensing and equitable access with respect to health technologies are increasingly discussed in global forums, many stakeholders still perceive these concepts as risky or untested and at times still unknown. Discussions also highlight a perceived risk of unfair compromises and impossible balance between commercial interest and equitable access. This session will challenge that perception by showcasing concrete examples from organizations that have implemented responsible licensing strategies in ways that work for all stakeholders. By bringing together diverse voices from the academic, investor, and global health communities, we aim to demystify the process and demonstrate that equitable access is not only feasible—it’s manageable as common goal.

Objectives:

• Share practical experiences from organizations that have implemented socially responsible licensingand/or equitable access policies or have provided guidance on prospective solutions (Tiered pricing, non-exclusive licensing, reduced royalties, humanitarian use clauses, etc).
• Highlight different models and approaches towards implementation, such as empowering communities via capacity building, co-development and/or local adaptations, or voluntary licensing and technology transfer.
• Foster dialogue on how licensing can support societal impact without compromising innovation or sustainability and/or commercial interest. Covering issues such as licensor/licensee incentives and/or concerns such as reputation, market development, impact metrics.
• Improve Policy & Practice by focusing on the role of researchers, TTOs, funders, policy makers and international frameworks in supporting impact and equitable access.

Target Audience:
Licensing professionals, technology transfer officers, legal experts, funders, and industry representatives interested in practical, scalable models for responsible licensing.

As the Unified Patent Court (UPC) establishes its footing in Europe, the global landscape for Standard-Essential Patent (SEP) licensing and enforcement is evolving at unprecedented speed. The interplay between regional case law from interim licensing decisions in the UK to anti-suit injunctions in China, German filings involving US patents, and cross-border FRAND litigation, is redefining how innovation is monetized, protected, and shared across borders.
This session brings together leading experts from industry, academia, and private practice to discuss how these developments are shaping the future of global IP value creation. The panel will analyze how companies can effectively navigate this increasingly complex environment; nsuring fair, transparent, and innovation-friendly enforcement mechanisms while balancing competing jurisdictional approaches.

Key themes include:

• The UPC’s early case law and its impact on global licensing and litigation strategies
• Comparative insights from UK High Court’s interim licensing rulings and recent German filings involving U.S. patents
• The evolving stance of Chinese courts on global FRAND determinations and anti-suit injunctions
• The emerging balance between rights holder leverage and implementer protection across jurisdictions
• How international convergence — or fragmentation — could influence innovation funding and technology access

By bridging perspectives from Europe, Asia, and North America, this discussion aligns with the LESI 2026 conference theme, “INNOVATION TO IMPACT: IP as an International Growth Engine.”

The panel will illustrate how coherent and predictable SEP enforcement frameworks can stimulate investment, collaboration, and growth across connected industries from AI and automotive to consumer electronics and green technologies.

This session will be moderated by Ceren Pala Okat.

This session aims to be the sequel/second episode of the session already hold at LESI2025 in Singapore. It is grounded on the excellent feedback and high level of engagement achieved in that occasion. The session will bring together a new, innovative, and smart perspective on learning IP-related matters as a growth engine for business.

The IP serious game is an IP game, where the narrative will revolve around companies and characters already introduced during the first episode held in Singapore (such as famous Mr. Big). This time the task will be to solve IP related industries’ challenges.

The session is co-organised by three LESI Committees: WILA, High Tech, and Dispute Resolution. The game includes elements that cover and put focus on the goals and purpose of these three Committees taking into consideration the growth of the business that IP brings.

This panel will be interactive in the sense that the audience will have the active role of playing the game, having fun, and learning at the same time. The panel will encourage participants from diverse jurisdictions and professional backgrounds to share perspectives. Further, we intend to include senior industry leaders playing a role in challenging the audience to find solutions to problems/issues which arise in IP professionals’ everyday life, based on the experience of said senior industry persons.

After a short introduction by the game masters (i.e. moderator and speakers), the audience is asked to be part of the game and who wishes can take an active role.

The roles of the game will be, for example, in-house counsel, patent attorney, attorney-at-law, patent litigator, and licensing professional. Throughout the game the players will prepare for, and meet, IP issues. The game will be constructed similarly to strategy games, where you analyze a situation/case/company first, followed by a sequence of incidents.

The incidents are scenarios intended to make the players reflect on the topic and learn in a safe environment. We believe this session will again resonate strongly with LESI’s international audience, reinforcing LESI’s role as a thought leader in fostering innovative approaches to IP from a business perspective, and bringing concrete added value to the audience.

There are going to be teaser opportunities beforehand to bring awareness and expectation in order to engage members to attend the LESI conference in Dublin.

So, are you game?

This session will be moderated by Magnus Hakvåg.

This session will be moderated by Pamela Cox and Adam Rattray.

The session will discuss hot issues in SEP litigation around the world, including in the US, Germany, Brazil, and the UK, including with respect to injunctive relief and other remedies, time to trial, FRAND rate setting, etc. The panel features seasoned executives associated with operating companies, patent pools, and law firms.

This workshop will be moderated by Kevin Schubert. 

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