Dr Joanne van Harmelen is a qualified attorney with a PhD in medical microbiology and vaccine development and over 15 years of experience in the legal profession. Joanne’s approach to advising clients is to consider holistically the commercial and intellectual property aspects of the clients’ business. Her expertise extends to the assessment of the patentability of inventions; the preparation and filing of patent applications locally and abroad; the performance of freedom-to-operate assessments; general IP commercial transactional advice; IP due diligence assessments, and advice on IP and biotech-related regulatory legislation.

Her clients include leading international biotechnology companies and start-ups with operations in Africa, North America, Europe, Australasia and Asia. Joanne is the current President of the Licensing Executive Society of South Africa and has been consistently recognised as leading patent and IP lawyer by a number of rating agencies, including Chambers & Partners, IAM Global Leaders, IAM Patent 1000, IP Stars, The Legal 500 and Best Lawyers.