About the event
The seminar addresses the TRIPS-waiver for improving the supply of affordable vaccines in the developing world that South Africa and India proposed at the World Trade Organization in October 2020. In order to gauge the planned TRIPS-waiver’s fitness for its intended purpose the seminar will explore the problems confronting vaccine access in the pandemic and what patents can and cannot do to help resolve these problems. The seminar will also look at other ways to improve the availability of vaccines on the African continent in future pandemics (which may not be global, but African only).
About the speaker
Professor Christoph Ann
Technical University of Munich
Prof Christoph Ann has held the TUM School of Management’s Chair of Intellectual Property (focussing on patents and trade secrets) since 2003. He teaches IP Law at both TUM and the Munich Intellectual Property Law Center. From 2001- 2003, Prof. Ann served as a judge on the Mannheim Regional Court’s prominent IP Infringement Panel. His academic focus are Patents & Trade Secrets including Licensing and Competition Law and IP in Africa. His publications include seven books, among them the German speaking world’s leading treatise on patent law, and more than 170 contributions to books and law review articles. Prof. Ann is a listed Neutral with the WIPO Arbitration and Mediation Center and has frequently served as an arbitrator. In 2021, Prof Ann was granted a Research Fellowship at South Africa’s Stellenbosch Institute for Advanced Study (STIAS), and in 2022 he was appointed member of the Free State of Bavaria’s state government’s Ethics Council (Bayerischer Ethikrat).