Author name: Shamnad Basheer

Prof. (Dr.) Shamnad Basheer founded SpicyIP in 2005. He's also the Founder of IDIA, a project to train underprivileged students for admissions to the leading law schools. He served for two years as an expert on the IP global advisory council (GAC) of the World Economic Forum (WEF). In 2015, he received the Infosys Prize in Humanities in 2015 for his work on legal education and on democratising the discourse around intellectual property law and policy. The jury was headed by Nobel laureate, Prof. Amartya Sen. Professional History: After graduating from the NLS, Bangalore Prof. Basheer joined Anand and Anand, one of India’s leading IP firms. He went on to head their telecommunication and technology practice and was rated by the IFLR as a leading technology lawyer. He left for the University of Oxford to pursue post-graduate studies, completing the BCL, MPhil and DPhil as a Wellcome Trust scholar. His first academic appointment was at the George Washington University Law School, where he served as the Frank H Marks Visiting Associate Professor of IP Law. He then relocated to India in 2008 to take up the MHRD Chaired Professorship in IP Law at WB NUJS, a leading Indian law school. Later, he was the Honorary Research Chair of IP Law at Nirma University and also a visiting professor of law at the National Law School (NLS), Bangalore. Prof. Basheer has published widely and his articles have won awards, including those instituted by ATRIP, the Stanford Technology Law Review and CREATe. He was consulted widely by the government, industry, international organisations and civil society on a variety of IP issues. He also served on several government committees.

Roche (Valcyte) vs Cipla (Valcept): Bombay High Court Injuncts Cipla

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In a decision that is likely to impact the pharma stock market (albeit slightly), the Bombay High Court restrained Cipla from using the mark “Valcept” or any mark that was confusingly similar to Roche’s trademark “Valcyte”. Roche sued Cipla in September this year alleging both patent infringement and trademark infringement, in respect of an anti infective, “Valgancyclovir”, sold as “Valcyte” by Cipla and ‘Valcept” by Cipla. Read the stories here at the Mint, DNA, Business Standard and Economic Times. It […]

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Sir Hugh Laddie: Commemorating the Wittiest IP Maverick Ever

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In the last couple of days, I have made many an attempt to key in a few words to express my deep sorrow at the passing away of an IP maverick and a very dear friend and mentor, Sir Hugh Laddie. Unfortunately, as they say, when the heart is heavy, words are but few. I spent a large part of this evening going back to the email exchanges that I’ve had with him since I’ve known him (for the last

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IP Podcast from Duncan Bucknell: Dilution and Software Patents

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Duncan Bucknell, a leading global IP strategist and an ex-SpicyIP blogger has, once again demonstrated his dynamism by putting together weekly podcasts discussing key IP events around the world. This week’s podcast has Jeremy Philips of the IPKat, who we’ve decided to christen the “Da Vinci” of the IP world (given the multifarious IP hats that he wears) and me. We discuss: i) The Intel dilution case that Jeremy has been blogging about. ii) The Indian Ford (dilution) case that

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Legal Education in India. Evolution of Phase 3?

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For those of you interested in legal education in India and reforms in this regard, I have a post out at “Law and Other Things”, another blog that I contribute to. To access this post, please see here. I start by noting: “I recently joined the National University of Juridical Sciences (NUJS), Kolkata, ranked as one of the top five law schools in India (along with NLS (Bangalore), Nalsar (Hyderabad), NLIU (Bhopal) and NLU (Jodhpur)). Many friends and well wishers

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Kolkata Patent Office Meeting: No "Technical" Software Patents

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The last round of the stakeholder’s meeting to discuss issues around the patent draft manual concluded on 22nd of November in Kolkata. Since I am now based in Kolkata, I had the good fortune of attending this meeting and witnessing the interactions first hand. It was reasonably well attended, with the majority of the audience from Kolkatta based law firms. It was chaired by Mr NN Prasad, named by MIP as one of the 50 most influential IP figures this

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Mattel Files Appeal in Scrabulous Matter: Jaitley vs Singhvi Again

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SpicyIP has just learnt that Mattel has preferred an appeal against Justice Bhat’s order in the SCRABULOUS matter. For our previous posts on this case, see here and here. The appeal is being heard by a Division Bench consisting of Justice Vikramajit Sen and Justice S L Bhayana. The matter came up in court last Thursday and was argued by Jaitley on behalf of Mattel. The Agarwalla brothers are represented by Dr. Abhishek Manu Singhvi and Mr. Sanjay Jain. Interesting

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Indian Copyright Collecting Societies and Foreign Royalties: Whither Transparency?

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We have a rather provocative guest post from Nikhil Krishnamurthy, a dear friend and an exceptionally talented copyright lawyer ( I say this out of experience, having worked with him on several IP matters in my past life as an IP practitioner). Nikhil’s post raises some serious issues about whether or not Phonographic Performance Ltd (PPL: a sound recording collecting society registered under the Indian copyright act) has the right to collect licence fees on behalf of foreign sound recording

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Indian "Bayh Dole" Bill Clears Cabinet: But Still Remains a Secret

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A couple of days back, the Hindu Business Line reported that the “Union Cabinet at a meeting chaired by Prime Minister Dr Mannmohan Singh …approved the Protection and Utilisation of Public Funded Intellectual Property Bill 2008”. The Mint responded to this news in a very punchy edit, reiterating concerns of “secrecy” and lack of sufficient “public interest” safeguards: Not in Public Interest “It is quite curious. Just a week ago, science and technology minister Kapil Sibal acknowledged media and experts’

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Barrack Obama and the "Change" in IP Policy

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Newspapers the world over have begun predicting the prospects of a “new” world under recent President elect, Barrack Obama. And in our esoteric IP world, talks have begun on what his appointment means for IP policy, both in the US and internationally. Interestingly, one of President Obama’s chief IP advisors is Professor Arti Rai, a renowned Duke University law professor of Indian origin. Liza Porteus, Kaitlin Mara and William New of IPWatch have put together reactions from various folks in

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Patenting Software and Business Methods In India

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The Mint published an op-ed of mine cautioning that India should simply read its statute in a straightforward manner to exclude software and business method patents. And that we ought not to resort to legal sophistry and buy into the tortuous interpretations advanced by US and EU courts on this count. If at all software and business method patents are to be granted, they can be done only through an express statutory amendment. Here is the text: A Method to

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