We were pleased to hold an engaging conversation with former Chief Justice of the High Court of Australia and Chancellor of the University of Western Australia, Prof. Robert French AC together with NFMRI’s CEO, Dr. Noel Chambers, on Wednesday, 16 October 2024 in Brisbane.
The discussion focused on inventorship and intellectual property protection and explored:
- Concepts around discovery and innovation;
- Who is an inventor?;
- What happens if you get this wrong?; and importantly
- Things you can do to support IP protection before it even exists.
The free event was relevant for all types of inventors across different disciplines, as well as those providing leadership, support and guidance.
“Inventorship is a critical concept in patent law, because it determines who can own the rights to a patented invention. If the inventors are not correctly identified, patent ownership will be uncertain, and the patent may be invalid. It is thus crucial to know who is – and, equally importantly, who is not – the inventor of an invention.
Inventorship of an invention is not the same thing as authorship of a paper describing an invention. Applying protocols and practices about scientific authorship to inventorship is both wrong and dangerous. If you only ever get to know one thing about patent law, you should make it knowing about inventorship.”
PROFESSOR ANDREW CHRISTIE, MELBOURNE LAW SCHOOL
Thank you to Queensland Health for kindly hosting the event.