Foundation Lectures

The Informals Committee organises a series of Foundation Lectures each year, running from January through to the summer. Each lecture focuses on a specific topic which is of relevance not only to examinations but also to day-to-day practice for a trainee patent attorney. The lectures are designed to introduce trainees to some of the key topics which are useful in day-to-day work and which form part of the Foundation exams.

All of the lectures are recorded, so that you can listen to them at your leisure and as often as you like. The recordings and slides are available via the Lecture Archive on the CIPA website (see https://www.cipa.org.uk/lecture-archive/).

The lectures are planned for Tuesday evenings and are usually at CIPA Viaro House, 20-23 Holborn, London, EC1N 2JD.

		Topic	Location	Speaker	Start time	Zoom link
January	9	Introductory Lecture	CIPA HQ	Sarah Turp	5.30pm	Click here to join
	16	Novelty and Inventive Step	CIPA HQ	Bethan Halliwell	5.30pm	Click here to join
	23	Patentability and Excluded Matter	online only	Drew Rudhall
	30	Patent Searching	CIPA HQ	Matthew Hall
February	6	Amendments	online only	Julia Gwilt
	13	Priority	CIPA HQ	Julia Mills
	20	Claim Construction & Scope of Protection	CIPA HQ	James St Ville
	27	Biotech Patents	online only	Abi Heath
March	5	BREAK	–	–
	12	EPC	online only	Nick Noble
	19	Renewals, Reinstatements and Restitution	CIPA HQ	Rhian Granleese
	26	Infringement	TBC	TBC
April	2	BREAK	–	–
	9	Trade Secrets	online only	Tom Lingard
	16	PCT	CIPA HQ	Andrew Smith
	23	Ownership and Entitlement	TBC	TBC
	30	Computer Patents		Parminder Lally