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Lee Davies has been the Chief Executive of the Chartered Institute of Patent Attorneys (CIPA) since February 2012. Prior to this, Lee was the Deputy Chief Executive of the Institute for Learning (IfL), the professional body for further education teachers. Lee’s professional background is in engineering (mechanical services) and further education teaching. Lee has experience of the governance of professional bodies, having served as the President of the Chartered Institute of Plumbing and Heating Engineering (CIPHE) in 2011-12.
Lee says that such a varied career, from apprentice plumber to CEO of CIPA, via organisations such as the Highbury College in Portsmouth, the Workers’ Educational Association (WEA) and IfL, has left him a little confused about his professional identity. Lee now identifies as an ‘association leader’, although the concept of association leadership is, in Lee’s words, “woefully undervalued and little recognised in the UK”. Lee is a passionate advocate for the association sector and is President and Chair of the Institute of Association Leadership (IAL), where he leads the Chief Executives’ Forum.

Andy was recently appointed Deputy CEO and Director of Services of the UK Intellectual Property Office, the Executive Agency of UK Government responsible for the intellectual property system in the UK.

In this role, Andy is responsible for all the IPO’s registered rights functions; patents, trade marks and designs, including the associated tribunal and mediation services.  He also has responsibility for Digital, Data and Technology (DDaT) services and for delivering the One IPO Transformation Programme.

He has a wealth of leadership experience in various policy, ambassadorial and operational and programme delivery roles within IPO.  Most recently he has been leading the IPO’s Programme to transform the way it delivers services for its customers including the deployment of exponential technologies like AI.  He has had a longstanding role in initiatives to improve the international patent system including substantive patent law harmonisation and work-sharing frameworks such as the Patent Prosecution Highway.

He is a passionate advocate of the need to modernise the IP system to ensure it is optimally effective for encouraging innovation and economic growth & for delivering excellent customer service.

He joined the UK Intellectual Property Office as a patent examiner in 1990 after graduating in Physics from the University of Birmingham.

Simeon is Communications Lead for the One IPO Transformation Programme. He has worked in public sector communications for 15 years, having previously worked in a variety of comms roles at the Office for National Statistics and UK Statistics Authority. Simeon joined the IPO in 2020 and acts as a key link between IPO developers and customers. In his spare time, Simeon is an avid gamer and a Tae Kwon-do instructor.

Chris is Patent Subject Matter Expert for the One IPO Transformation Programme. This involves working with the development team and the wider IPO to help ensure that the new system meets the IPO’s needs. He has been a patent examiner for over 20 years, working primarily on chemical applications. Outside of work, Chris enjoys watching a wide variety of sports and is a fan of Coventry City.

Peter has 32 years of experience working in the UKIPO during which he has been Deputy Director, Head of Examination in the field of Telecommunications, a Tribunal Hearing Officer and Head of Patent Information and Commercial Search Services. Peter is recognised as an expert in patent search and classification. He has previously held the post of Deputy Chairman of WIPO’s IPC Committee of Experts and has been responsible for the introduction of EPOQUENET and the Co-operative Patent Classification (CPC) here at the UKIPO. Peter is currently one of four Service Owners on our programme of digital transformation where he is most recently lead a project to introduce a new cross rights online renewal service. As Head of Business Support and IT Services, his previous achievements include the delivery of an integrated document management system, a successful mainframe migration and implementation of the Federated Register. Peter is a qualified Programme Manager with experience of contract negotiations and working with 3rd party suppliers to deliver IT solutions. He is currently Deputy Chairman of the EPO’s Technical and Operational Support Committee (TOSC) and has played a lead role in European Co-operation since 2006.