Welcome to IP Provocations! In this first episode, we drill experts Janet Freilich and John Liddicoat about the extent to which the promises patent law makes match up with what happens in practice. Is the system working as it’s supposed to? Are patents incentivising the types of innovation we want most? Do we still see scientific breakthroughs without them? What would happen if every patent was actually enforced? And why on earth do people go to the effort of maintaining patents long after they realise the invention they’re protecting is useless?  

IP Provocations is hosted by the Melbourne Law School’s Professor Rebecca Giblin, and the University of Sydney’s Professor Kimberlee Weatherall. You can read more about Giblin’s work here, and Weatherall’s work here. This episode’s guests are:

Professor Janet Freilich is a Professor of Law at Fordham University. Prior to entering academia, she practiced as a patent litigator and prosecutor. You can read more about her research at her Fordham School of Law profile.

You can find Freilich’s paper on the replicability crisis in patent law here. We also discussed her paper on patents’ new salience, which looks at how the patent system has potentially worked precisely because it is under enforced, and how that’s now changing thanks to AI and other technology. You can read that here.

Dr John Liddicoat is senior lecturer in law at King’s College, London. He is particularly interested in biotechnology and life-sciences, and the role patent law plays incentivising innovation in these areas. Read more at his King’s College profile.

We covered Liddicoat’s research into how hospital and university trials actually increase once generic drugs are authorised. You can find that paper here.

IP Provocations is made with the support of IP Australia - we’re grateful to have had the opportunity to ask such broad ranging questions about the patent system to such interesting people, and get so many surprising answers. The IP Provocations team had full academic freedom in designing these conversations, and the views expressed are those of the individual speakers. 

This podcast was a project of IPRIA, the Intellectual Property Research Institute of Australia, and had additional support from Melbourne Law School and Sydney Law School. The music was composed and recorded by Nina Buchanan. The hosts are Professors Rebecca Giblin and Kimberlee Weatherall, and research support was provided by barrister Amy Surkis. The producer is Greta Robenstone. Anders Furze filled in all the remaining gaps.  

IP Provocations acknowledges the Traditional Owners of the lands on which this podcast was produced, the Wurundjeri Woi Wurrung People of the Kulin Nation, and the Gadigal people of the Eora nation. We pay our respects to their Elders, past and present. This podcast was produced on stolen land - sovereignty was never ceded. Always was, always will be, Aboriginal land.