Clyde & Co has welcomed Elliot Papageorgiou as a partner in Shanghai, appointing him to lead the firm’s intellectual property practice in the country.
Papageorgiou is joined by his team of four China-qualified and licensed lawyers, including one who is a licensed patent attorney in China, from IP consultancy Rouse. The team – which includes local partners Zhengquan Gu and Leo Tang, senior associate Molly Zhuang, and associate Ying Ying – is joining Clyde & Co’s joint law venture (JLV) in China, Clyde & Co Westlink.
“As the Chinese economy continues to mature, there is significant demand for the firm to extend our services in the region into IP,” said partner Ik Wei Chong, the firm’s Asia managing director.
Papageorgiou is originally from Australia, finishing accounting and computer science, and macro and microeconomics degrees from Murdoch University. At
Monash University, Papageorgiou finished his law degree and focused his honours research on pharmaceutical patent protection.
After graduating, he started his law career at
Clayton Utz before moving to London. He then read IP for the BCL at St Catherine’s College, Oxford, and started working on IP commercialisation and enforcement projects in Central and Western Europe, where he also used his skills in Hungarian, Serbian, Croatian, and German.
In 2005, Papageorgiou moved to China and spent the next 12 years at Rouse, building an IP practice in the Asia Pacific region. The practice focuses on the full IP-lifecycle, from strategic IP protection and portfolio advice, through to IP exploitation and commercialisation, IP enforcement, and litigation.
Papageorgiou said he joined Clyde & Co Westlink because it provides a unique combination of international legal expertise and strong on-the-ground experience in China.
“We are looking forward to extending the reach of Clyde & Co’s existing IP offering across China, and indeed across the region, thereby offering clients strategic IP solutions in one of the most, if not the most, exciting IP jurisdictions in the world,” he said.
The new team in China further bolsters the firm’s expansion of its IP practice, which includes strong offerings including in the UK and multiple locations in the Middle East. In 2015, partner David Wilkinson, who leads the IP practice in the UK, joined the firm. Since then, the UK IP team has grown to nine, including well-regarded patent litigator, Ralph Cox.
Elliot Papageorgiou
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