OHIM President outlines future plans in address to Administrative Board

The President of the Office for Harmonisation in the Internal Market (OHIM), António Campinos, in his first address to the Administrative Board as President, provided a detailed overview of Office performance during the preceding year and spoke of new challenges, including the 'quest for improved quality, cooperation and transparency'. The President stressed his commitment to cooperation between OHIM and National Offices, including bilateral cooperation. He also said that the OHIM Cooperation Fund would be an area of particular importance in the 2011 Work Programme and the Office would be doing everything in its power to create the best conditions to ensure the success of the Fund. Finally, Mr Campinos said that the European Commission had encouraged the Office to assume more competences in the field of intellectual property (IP) rights. The Directorate General for Internal Market and Services (DG MARKT) had agreed to launch preparatory work with an impact assessment foreseen for 2011.