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Professor Graeme Dinwoodie delivers 3rd EW Barker Centre for Law & Business Distinguished Visitor in Intellectual Property Lecture
On 5 April 2022, Professor Graeme Dinwoodie delivered the 3rd EW Barker Centre for Law & Business (EWBCLB) Distinguished Visitor in Intellectual Property Lecture, titled “Trademark Law as a Normative Project” at the NUS Bukit Timah Campus.
Professor Dinwoodie offered provocative perspectives on how a more normative engagement of issues of distinctiveness and the likelihood of confusion is important for trademark law. Professor Dinwoodie said: “The characterization of the likely confusion inquiry as empirical obscures unavoidable antecedent normative questions. … Survey evidence is routinely characterized by U.S. courts as the best evidence of likely confusion. … But, as has come to be understood by courts in many other countries such the United Kingdom, Canada or Australia, surveys might, at best, be unhelpful for any number of reasons. They increase the costs of litigation, which creates its own distortions on the ability to establish and defend rights.” He further contended that “concealing normative policy choices as empirical findings creates risks” and that “our search for a better trademark law will require instead that we continue to imagine openly a more normative regime.”
The Lecture attracted about 400 attendees on Zoom, and almost three dozen in person including Justice Kannan Ramesh (Supreme Court of Singapore), Dr Stanley Lai (Chairman, IPOS/Head of IP Practice, Allen & Gledhill), Mr Lam Chung Nian (Head of IP, Technology & Data Group, Wong Partnership), Mr Gilbert Leong (Head of IP and Technology Practice, Dentons Rodyk), and Mr Tony Yeo (Managing Director of IP Department, Drew & Napier).
Professor Simon Chesterman (Dean, NUS Law) officially welcoming guests to the Lecture
Professor David Tan (Head (Intellectual Property), EWBCLB) introducing the Distinguished Visitor
Professor Graeme Dinwoodie
Post-lecture discussion session moderated by Professor David Tan
Professor Ng-Loy Wee Loon poses a question
Dr Stanley Lai offers his perspective
The audience showing their appreciation at the end of the lecture – (L to R) Professor Simon Chesterman, Justice Kannan Ramesh, Professor Hans Tjio (Director, EWBCLB)
(L to R): Mr Lam Chung Nian (Wong Partnership), Mr Tony Yeo (Drew & Napier), Justice Kannan Ramesh (Supreme Court of Singapore), Dr Stanley Lai (IPOS/Allen & Gledhill), Professor Simon Chesterman, Professor Graeme Dinwoodie, Professor Ng-Loy Wee Loon, Professor Hans Tjio, Mr Gilbert Leong (Dentons Rodyk), Professor David Tan
About Professor Graeme B. Dinwoodie
Professor Graeme Dinwoodie is a world-renowned intellectual property scholar. Prior to his academic career, Professor Dinwoodie had been an associate with Sullivan and Cromwell in New York. He holds an LL.B. degree in Private Law (First Class Honours) from the University of Glasgow, an LL.M. from Harvard Law School, and a J.S.D. from Columbia Law School.
From 2005 to 2009, he held a Chair in Intellectual Property Law at Queen Mary College, University of London. Between 2009 and 2018, he was Professor of Intellectual Property and Information Technology Law at the University of Oxford, where he was also Director of the Oxford Intellectual Property Research Centre and a Professorial Fellow of St. Peter’s College.
Professor Dinwoodie rejoined Chicago-Kent College of Law in 2016 (having first joined the faculty in 2000), but now as a University Professor, an appointment reserved for “highly distinguished faculty who may be appointed by the President [of Illinois Institute of Technology] in recognition of their national reputations.” And in 2018, he returned full-time to Chicago-Kent upon his appointment as Global Professor of Intellectual Property Law.
Professor Dinwoodie is the author and co-author of many books and casebooks, articles and book chapters. Some of his books include A Neofederalist Vision of TRIPS: The Resilience of the International Intellectual Property Regime (Oxford University Press, 2012), Trademarks and Unfair Competition: Law and Policy (5th ed) (Aspen Publishing, 2018), Trade Dress and Design Law (Wolters Kluwer, 2010). His scholarship is widely cited by scholars in the United States and in the Commonwealth common law jurisdictions. He is considered a leading international authority in trademark law, design law, and international intellectual property law.
Amongst his numerous positions, Professor Dinwoodie has served as a consultant to WIPO and an adviser to the American Law Institute. Professor Dinwoodie has held a number of visiting or honorary positions in various law schools around the world. He also taught as a visitor at NUS Law in 2016 as the Yong Shook Lin Visiting Professor of Intellectual Property Law.
Please click here to watch the video presentation.