Ropes & Gray and Boston College Law School Co-Host 5th Annual International IP Summit

For the first time since the pandemic, the International IP Summit returned to in-person sessions on October 13—14 at Boston College Law School. Now in its 5^th year, the summit is co-hosted by Ropes & Gray and the Boston College Law School Program on Innovation and Entrepreneurship (PIE).

This year’s event drew 150 lawyers and business executives from technology and life sciences companies, academia, judiciary and government that gathered to examine complex legal issues facing U.S. technology and life sciences companies operating on a global scale. The summit has earned a reputation for one-of-a-kind, substantive panel discussions and opportunities for meaningful and actionable dialogue and positions Ropes & Gray and Boston College Law School as thought leaders in the global IP and legal community.

The summit featured over 30 speakers from around the world, including Germany, France, Brazil and Nigeria, as well as speakers from the judiciary, academia, and the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office. Attendees from Boston-area technology and life sciences companies included BeiGene, Biogen, Bain Capital, Butterfly Network, IBM, Rapid7, State Street, Toast, Whoop, Inc., and Sanofi, among others.

Panels explored complex and timely topics such as the evolving regulatory and IP protection landscape for non-fungible tokens (NFTs), cryptocurrencies, and other fintech offerings; whether protections for IP owners and patent holders have gone too far; issues relating to the expected launch of the Unified Patent Court; and general counsel insights on how they are managing uncertainty in the fast-evolving legal landscape, ESG standards in a post-pandemic world. The second day of the summit featured an invitation-only roundtable which explored a range of topics, including pending legislations and policy proposals, ESG compliance, and the deal-making trends in the life sciences and tech industries.;

The summit was co-chaired by Ropes & Gray IP transactions partner Regina Sam Penti, retired Ropes & Gray partner, Ed Kelly, and Professor David Olson, Associate Professor and Faculty Director for PIE at Boston College Law School. It was headlined by Lynnette Fallon, Executive Vice President and General Counsel of Axcelis Technologies as keynote speaker, who shared her experience, spanning over two decades, leading a capital equipment semiconductor company through downturn and significant growth.

Asset management partner Melissa Bender, litigation & enforcement partner Ama Adams, IP transactions partner and practice co-chair Melissa Rones, IP litigation partner Sam Brenner, mergers & acquisitions partner Chris Comeau, litigation & enforcement partner Samer Musallam and IP transactions associate Raj Banerjee also spoke at the event.

A complete list of panels and speakers is available here.

The summit included a panel on “Leading and Thriving Through Prolonged Uncertainty: A Conversation with General Counsels”

The 5th Annual International IP Summit hosted at Boston College Law School was co-chaired by Ropes & Gray IP transactions partner Regina Sam Penti.