The 94th Council of the European Patent Institute (EPI) - an association of European patent attorneys from 39 countries, in which about 14,000 representatives are members, including 18 from North Macedonia (MK), which was held in Malmö, Sweden, on 2 and On May 3, 2023, the composition of the Council was established, and a new presidency was elected. The new councilors from MK are: Vancho Damjanski, member, (Berin), Bogoljub Ilievski (present), member, Gjorgi Filipov, present, (Berin), deputy. member and Valentin Pepeljugoski, deputy. member. Vancho Damjanski was elected as a member of the Disciplinary Committee, as a representative from MK. The members of the other committees will be elected at least one month before the autumn meeting of the Council. The new EPI Council also elected the members of the Board (Presidency), which included: president, Peter Thomsen, Switzerland (CH), vice-presidents: Mrs. Katerina Hartvičova, Czech Republic (CZ) and Tiemen Reins, Netherlands (NL), general secretary, Mrs. Magdalena Augustyniak, Poland (PL), deputy. gen. Secretary, Mrs. Ann De Klerk, Belgium (BE), Treasurer, Zolt Scentpeteri, Hungary, (HU) and Deputy. treasurer, Andreas Winter, Germany (DE). The President of the European Patent Office (EPO), Antonio Campinos, addressed the attendees of the Council with a video message.
During the two-day work of the Council, the results of the election of the new councilors were presented and determined, the reports from the work of the previous presidency (president, vice-presidents, general secretary, executive director) were adopted, and the members of the Council were introduced to the candidates for the new presidency. After the lunch break, the election of the new members of the Presidency was started, after which the Council voted and elected the aforementioned members. The old treasurer and the new president of Soweto, Peter Thomsen submitted a financial report and presented the budget of the Council for the next year, to which amendments were submitted with a request for an increase due to the participation of the members of the Council in the big celebration on the occasion of 50 years of the European Patent Convention, which will be held in October this year in Munich. On the second day of the work of the Council, after the reports submitted by the presidents of the respective committees of the Council, and after the report on the work of the Disciplinary Committee, a new Disciplinary Committee was elected, in which MK is represented by colleague Damjanski. Two new auditors and their deputies were also elected, and amendments to the procedure for election of committee members were presented. Before the end of the work, a review of all the decisions made, adopted reports and presentations was made, and then the Council finished the work with an address to the new president and symbolic taking of seats at the presiding table by all the newly elected members of the presidency.
The council was held at the Clarion Hotel Malmö Live, and the hosts organized excursions to Copenhagen (Denmark), with a visit to the royal palace and Lund (university center, the second oldest in Sweden, after Uppsala) and Malmö (Sweden), in which they were also allowed to participate the companions of the members of the Council. A special one-day excursion "Explore Malmö on foot and by boat" was organized for companions only. For the final act of the event, an exclusive dinner was arranged at the "Luftkastellet" restaurant, right on the seafront, with a beautiful view of the sunset and the combination of futuristic architecture and nature at the Swedish end of the bridge connecting Malmö and Copenhagen.
We congratulate the members of the former presidency and the colleagues of the Swedish group of European patent attorneys, as well as the employees of the EPI secretariat for the successful organization of the event, both from a professional, as well as from a social and collegial point of view.
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