By Ganna Prokhorova, ECTA Anti-Counterfeiting Committee Member, Mamunya IP, Ukraine


I am a Ukrainian IP attorney. A proud citizen of Ukraine, a sovereign, independent, and free European country with its peaceful people. Peaceful, but also inexhaustible resistant, and brave.

With this ECTA Members’ Voice, I would like to express my appreciation for all the sympathy and support to Ukrainian IP-family members and all the people of Ukraine suffering tremendously from the Russian invasion.

The support also comes from ECTA, who refunded the 2022 ECTA membership fees to all Ukrainian members and significantly reduced registration fees for the Annual Conference in Copenhagen. We highly appreciate the help and solidarity we all receive these days.

As an active member of our IP community, I am often asked what help can be given to Ukrainian IP lawyers, apart from donations,, which many of you do. At the first glance, there are several possibilities to help IP lawyers, for instance:

• advising clients that Ukraine remains a viable jurisdiction with promising long-term prospects and significant European market share;
• making the preferred Ukrainian agent as an IP Hub to former CIS countries;
• continuing including Ukraine in the client’s IP filing strategy;
• informing clients about continuity of service of governmental institutions in Ukraine, including UAPTO for prosecution and courts for enforcement, and a possibility to directly file national applications (patents, design, and trade marks) and also PCT national phase;
• offering internships to Ukrainian IP professionals temporarily evacuated in areas of those IP attorneys who are willing to help;
• sheltering Ukrainian IP professionals fleeing the war in that area;
• hiring Ukrainian IP professionals temporarily evacuated for a temporary job;
• providing a remote job to Ukrainian IP professionals displaced within Ukraine, etc.

If you attend the ECTA 40th Annual Conference and want to discuss in more detail the potential help you can deliver or terms of business operation in Ukraine during these unprecedented times, let’s meet during the first Coffee Break in Scandic Copenhagen at 3.30 pm, June 15, 2022. If you are not available at this time, please feel to reach out through ECTA 40th Annual Conference App, my personal LinkedIn, or contact details that you already know.

I am very much looking forward to seeing you all in a few days!