Bonum Certa Men Certa

EPO Exposé: The Besieged Baltic States – Part IX – António's Faithful Acolyte in Alicante

Series index:

  1. EPO Exposé: The Besieged Baltic States – Part I – More Captured Delegates?
  2. EPO Exposé: The Besieged Baltic States – Part II – Old Wine in New Bottles...
  3. EPO Exposé: The Besieged Baltic States – Part III – Introducing the Finnish “Facilitator”
  4. EPO Exposé: The Besieged Baltic States – Part IV – Martti Enäjärvi and His “Good Brother” Networks
  5. EPO Exposé: The Besieged Baltic States – Part V – A Man With a Conviction...
  6. EPO Exposé: The Besieged Baltic States – Part VI – "A Good Friend of Estonia and a Steady Cooperation Partner”
  7. EPO Exposé: The Besieged Baltic States – Part VII – A Self-Appointed “Select Committee”
  8. EPO Exposé: The Besieged Baltic States – Part VIII – Pulling for the Portuguese Pretender?
  9. You are here ☞ António's Faithful Acolyte in Alicante


Joao Negrao
Mr. João Negrão [PDF] followed his master António Campinos to Alicante in 2010 where he soon became Director of International Cooperation and Legal Affairs at the EU trademark agency.



Summary: "Of course Campinos could have tried to switch his own nationality to "French" but that wouldn't have gone down well either because he had been elected as Benoît Battistelli's successor on the premise that he was "Portuguese"."

Upon taking up his appointment as Executive Director of the EU trademark agency OHIM/EUIPO in October 2010, Campinos was immediately joined in Alicante by his faithful acolyte, João Negrão [PDF], who became his chef-de-cabinet.



"Between 2010 and 2018, Negrão followed his master like Mary's little lamb."About a year or so later Negrão became Director of the International Cooperation and Legal Affairs Department of the trademark agency.

Between 2010 and 2018, Negrão followed his master like Mary's little lamb.

Wherever Campinos popped up on an OHIM "duty mission", Negrão was usually to be seen in close proximity.

For example, the pair were spotted together in Estonia in October 2015 and in Iceland in May 2016 at a shindig to celebrate the 25th anniversary of the Icelandic Patent Office.

António Campinos in Estonia
Campinos and Negrão in Estonia in October 2015.



António Campinos and Joao Negrao in Iceland
Campinos and Negrão joined Borghildur Erlingsdótti and her friends in Reykjavík in May 2016 for a shindig to celebrate the 25th anniversary of the Icelandic Patent Office.



"Despite their close - almost symbiotic - working relationship over the years, Negrão didn't end up following Campinos to Munich in July 2018."They also turned up together in Monaco in March 2017 for a meeting with Monegasque officials "to consider areas of potential cooperation between EUIPO and the National Intellectual Property Office of Monaco" and in San Marino in May 2017 to sign a bilateral "Memorandum of Understanding".

António Campinos and Joao Negrao in Monaco
Campinos and Negrão in Monaco in March 2017.



Despite their close - almost symbiotic - working relationship over the years, Negrão didn't end up following Campinos to Munich in July 2018.

Campinos would probably have liked to bring his faithful and long-serving acolyte with him. However, under the unwritten rules governing senior EPO appointments it would have been impossible to appoint a Vice-President having the same nationality as the President.

"Campinos would probably have liked to bring his faithful and long-serving acolyte with him."Of course Campinos could have tried to switch his own nationality to "French" but that wouldn't have gone down well either because he had been elected as Benoît Battistelli's successor on the premise that he was "Portuguese".

"Of course Campinos could have tried to switch his own nationality to "French" but that wouldn't have gone down well either because he had been elected as Benoît Battistelli's successor on the premise that he was "Portuguese"."Because there was no realistic chance of a job to match his expectations in Munich, Negrão chose to remain in Alicante.

With the onset of the Covid-19 pandemic, opportunities for "duty travel" have become more limited and nowadays most business is conducted using videoconferencing.

"But even if Negrão's relationship with his new boss Christian Archambeau is a bit more "socially distanced" and things seem less cosy than they were under Campinos, this hasn't hampered his career progression."For example on 13 January 2021, Negrão took part in a ViCo with the EU Director-General for Research and Innovation, Jean-Eric Paquet and on 15 February 2021, he participated in a "virtual meeting" with the Portuguese INPI.

But even if Negrão's relationship with his new boss Christian Archambeau is a bit more "socially distanced" and things seem less cosy than they were under Campinos, this hasn't hampered his career progression.

On the contrary, in November 2020 it was reported that Negrão had been elected as President of EUIPO's Boards of Appeal and he took up his new position on 1 April 2021.

"But since neither Battistelli nor Campinos took the "judicial independence" of the EPO Boards of Appeal seriously, Negrão is unlikely to be concerned about the supposedly inferior status of the Boards over which he presides."EUIPO's Boards of Appeal are only an administrative instance whose decisions are subject to judicial review by the Court of Justice of the EU. So they don't have quite the same status or "cachet" as the EPO's Boards of Appeal which are an independent judicial body - at least on paper.

But since neither Battistelli nor Campinos took the "judicial independence" of the EPO Boards of Appeal seriously, Negrão is unlikely to be concerned about the supposedly inferior status of the Boards over which he presides.

One advantage that the EUIPO Boards of Appeal have over those at the EPO is that they don't have to pretend to be a judicial instance or worry about the perception of independence.

That concludes our review of the circumstances surrounding the secretive meeting which took place at the Estonian Patent Office in January 2010 and its effects on the careers of some of those involved.

"EUIPO's Boards of Appeal are only an administrative instance whose decisions are subject to judicial review by the Court of Justice of the EU."It seems fair to say that this little conclave in Tallinn had a significant influence on the course of events over the following decade, both at the EPO and at the EUIPO.

Indeed, it would appear to have brought considerable benefits to some of the participants.

"...it would appear to have brought considerable benefits to some of the participants."In the next part we shall look at another event which was held in the same place a little over two years later in March 2012 and which drew the great and good of the "global IP community" to Tallinn, namely the official ceremony commemorating the 20th anniversary of the re-establishment of the Estonian Patent Office.

Recent Techrights' Posts

Azure is Turning 17 This Year, Still Losing Money and Staff
Hallmark of pyramid schemes, deriving "value" out of things that do not really exist?
Richard Stallman on RISC-V and Free Hardware
Invidious is under attack by Google
 
Alex Oliva, the Potential 'Successor' of RMS, Has a New Web Site
More freedom for Alex Oliva
Links 16/02/2025: "Microsoft Is Laying Off Employees" and Internal Dissent Brewing at Facebook Over Regime Complicity
Links for the day
Promoting Microsoft Windows With LLM Slop
What is the policy at BetaNews regarding LLM slop?
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Saturday, February 15, 2025
IRC logs for Saturday, February 15, 2025
Links 15/02/2025: Harms to Health, Public Domain, and More
Links for the day
Gemini Links 15/02/2025: On Autistic People, AuraGem Over HTTPS
Links for the day
The Cyber Show (C|S) Speaks of the "Rise of the Nerd Reich."
This 'Valentine Episode' is quite good
Strong Momentum for the Free Software Foundation (FSF) as Winter Approaches Its End in Boston or in the Northern Hemisphere
FSF's founder, Richard Stallman, gives another talk in Italy in 9 days from now
The 'Drunken Plagiarists' Are Harming Journalism About GNU/Linux
They lessen the incentive to do real journalism abut GNU/Linux
Female Nazis and racist Swiss women
Reprinted with permission from Daniel Pocock
Links 15/02/2025: Erasing of American Science and Tesla SLAPPing Critics
Links for the day
IDG 'Reviews' of GNU/Linux Now Contain LLM Slop
It's typically ads or commercials... or sometimes spin disguised as news
Gemini Links 15/02/2025: Spectacles and "Before Sunset", Moving Domains Out of the US
Links for the day
Microsoft Has Only $17,482 Million Left, "Cash on Hand" Sank 40 Billion Dollars in 2 Years
Microsoft runs low on money in the bank
YouTube Layoffs Mean That YouTube is Still Losing a Lot of Money (Net Income or Profit Almost Definitely Negative)
In more recent years Google defunded many vloggers
In Gopher and Gemini Protocol People Abandon Services Based in the United States
There's no resistance whatsoever
Python and Microsoft: Pandas Should Have Known OpenDocument Format (ODF) and Microsoft Excel Are Different and Competing Things
now we're meant to think that in order to open ODF files we need some functions with "Excel" in their name
Not Only Windows, Surface, and "Hey Hi" PCs; Microsoft's Hardware Ventures Are a Dumpster Fire; HoloLens Mixed Reality Hardware Now Axed Altogether and Staff is Miserable
Microsoft is in a terrible state
Certificate Authority (CA) Let's Encrypt Now Down to TEN (0.3% of the Whole) in Geminispace
The number of capsules that use Let's Encrypt is, according to Lupa, about to fall to single-digit figures
Links 15/02/2025: University Price Hikes and Copyright Action Against Slop Companies
Links for the day
Slopwatch: All Those New 'Articles' Are Fake and Crafted by Chatbots (LLM Slop)
Google News is promoting these as "Linux" news; they're not even made by humans
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Friday, February 14, 2025
IRC logs for Friday, February 14, 2025
Gemini Links 14/02/2025: Mysterious Friend and "Eight by Eight"
Links for the day
They Will Never Leave Linus Torvalds Alone, Rust is Just Another Way to Cause Instability and Infighting in Linux
We already identified the Rust "community" as troublemakers more than 5 years ago and we wrote about the evidence
Apple: Social Justice or Social Nationalism?
Remember to buy Apple, folks
Links 14/02/2025: Mass Layoffs at Sophos, Chatbots Failing Very Badly, "DOGE as a National Cyberattack"
Links for the day
Moving Away From Certificate Authorities (CAs) Like Let's Encrypt Means Taking Away From the US Government the Power to 'Censor' Sites by Revoking Certificates
Gemini capsule is cheap to run and easy (easier than a Web site) to maintain. More people disillusioned and frustrated with social control media flock to it.
BetaNews' Managing Editor Wayne William Took Charge of GNU/Linux Articles and His Articles Are Real (He Actually Wrote Them)
We are frankly relieved to see that Wayne William recognised the problem and did something about it
Links 14/02/2025: Publicity Rights Violated (ByteDance), Bribes to Trump Passed via Social Control Media 'Settlements' Again
Links for the day
Gemini Links 14/02/2025: Constitution, Cosmic DE, and More
Links for the day
Slopwatch: Anti-Linux Articles Published by Bots, Dominating Google News
So a lot of the Web is Microsoft chatbot-generated anti-Linux FUD
Links 14/02/2025: Measles Outbreak in Texas, Zelensky Warns Russia Will Attack a NATO Country
Links for the day
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Thursday, February 13, 2025
IRC logs for Thursday, February 13, 2025