January 16, 2017
Jo Johnson appointed as new Minister for IP
Jo Johnson appointed as new Minister for IP
Jo Johnson, younger brother of Foreign Secretary and former Mayor of London, Boris Johnson, has been named as the new Minister for Intellectual Property.  He succeeds Baroness Neville-Rolfe, who stepped down from the role in December 2016 after two-and-a-half years in post.

A former investment banker and journalist, Jo Johnson has held office as MP for Orpington since May 2010 and was appointed Minister of State for Universities, Science, Research and Innovation in July 2016.  He will be the eighth incumbent of the role of Minister for Intellectual Property since the post was created in 2007.

Jo Johnson takes on the role at a critical time, as the IP community braces itself for impact of the Brexit vote in the June 2016 referendum (incidentally, whilst his older brother was instrumental in the “Leave” campaign during the referendum, Jo Johnson firmly backed “Remain”).  In the midst of  the uncertainty, we can only hope that Jo Johnson will, like Baroness Neville-Rolfe, remain longer in the role of Minister for IP than the majority of his predecessors to provide continuity as the country works out how to reconfigure  the UK and EU IP systems in the wake of Brexit.

For more thoughts from Stobbs on the impact of Brexit, see our latest post on the Kluwer Trademark Blog here.
Tags
Trademarks /  Brexit /  Designs & Copyright /  Patents

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