Ropes & Gray and Boston College Law School Co-Host Summit on IP and Innovation in a Time of Disruption and Uncertainty

In The News
October 30, 2020

Ropes & Gray and the Boston College Law School co-hosted a four-day, virtual summit, from October 2023, on complex intellectual property and technology law issues facing U.S. companies operating on a global scale. 

Now in its third year, the International IP Summit has rapidly become a premier forum for practitioners, business leaders, academics, and government officials to explore the dramatically evolving global IP environment and related issues facing multinational companies. The event was conceived and co-chaired by Regina Sam Penti and Ed Kelly, both partners in Ropes & Gray’s IP transactions practice, along with Professor David Olson, Associate Professor and Faculty Director for the Program on Innovation and Entrepreneurship (PIE) at Boston College Law School.

Sandy Leung, executive vice president and general counsel at Bristol-Myers Squibb delivered the keynote remarks, highlighting the IP challenges that the biopharma industry faces even as it expends enormous resources in the race toward vaccines and treatments for the COVID-19 pandemic. Leung also emphasized the importance of collaborative partnerships and the critical role that diversity and inclusion plays in driving innovation and BMS’s vision of the future.

This year’s event drew over 250 lawyers and business executives from technology and life sciences companies, academia, and government. Featuring over 35 speakers from China, Germany and the United States, the panels explored complex and timely topics such as the development, production and distribution of COVID-19 vaccines and treatments; digital health considerations in China; emerging trends in IP and innovation; deal-making in times of escalating international sanctions and trade disputes; and the regulatory landscape for life sciences companies in the US, Europe and China.

In addition, Ropes & Gray IP transactions partner Melissa Rones; life sciences regulatory & compliance partners Kellie Combs and Katherine Wang; private equity transactions partner Minh-Chau Le; IP litigation counsel Sam Brenner; and litigation & enforcement counsel Brendan Hanifin also spoke at the event.

A complete list of panels, speakers and recordings is available here.

IP Summit Panel