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Madelein Kleyn

Chief Legal and IP Officers, Omnisient Rf Pty, South Africa

Dr. Madelein Kleyn has more than 30 years international experience as intellectual property practitioner, patent attorney and in-house legal counsel in the petrochemical and agri industries. She is presently the Chief Legal Officer of Omnisient (Pty) Ltd a company specializing in data collaboration and anonymization . She also is the CEO and founder of Mad K IP consulting (Pty) Ltd a private company advising clients on IP matters. She is a qualified chemical engineer (BSc Chem Eng), an admitted attorney of the High Court of South Africa and a registered South African patent attorney. She holds a LLM in tax law and PhD in intellectual property law. Her technical expertise is in the area of petrochemicals, chemistry, process engineering, explosives and agriculture. Madelein’s main areas of expertise include IP Portfolio management, IP policy and strategy development and implementation. She regularly advises on corporate governance and IP risk management and specializes in drafting and advising on IP-related business transactions, including technology transfer and licensing. She has authored and presented various articles, papers and publications on IP matters internationally specifically on technology and IP licensing and commentaries on national IP related legislation. Since 2014 she is the co-editor of the textbook “International Pharmaceutical Law” and is also a co-author of the South African Chapter of this publication. She is a member of the SAIIPL (South African Institute of Intellectual Property Lawyers) and also the editor of the SAIIPL newsletter IP Briefs™. She is a member of INTA (International Trademark Association) and CCASA (Corporate Counsel Association of South Africa), ACS (American Chemical Society) and SARIMA ( Southern African Research & Innovation Management Association). She is also member of LES (License Executive Society of South Africa - past president) and a Vice President of LES International. Madelein was included in the IAM Strategy 300 – The World’s Leading IP Strategists since 2015 and featured in WTR300 World’s leading trademark professionals since 2016 and included in IAM Global leaders 2023 and 2024

Assignment of Invention – the importance of the assignment date and impact on patent validity
In the recent case, Regents of the University of California and Others v Eurolab (Pty) Ltd and Others ( 2024-039643 ; 2023-108509) [2025] ZACCP 1 (25 February 2025) the Court...Read more
The Interplay between Antitrust Law and Intellectual Property Law in South Africa: A Critical Analysis of the OECD Recommendation on Intellectual Property Rights and Competition
The interplay between competition law and intellectual property remains the subject of much debate. Intellectual property creates monopolistic rights to protect and reward innovation and incentivise creators; whilst competition law...Read more
Patent law differs in each country, but there are some important equitable doctrines that apply across borders. One such a doctrine is prosecution history estoppel. The term Estoppel ...Read more
A right to copy, right?
Copyright is an intellectual property right that vests automatically. The question arises, whether the right has international enforcement due to the nature of the right. Copyright subsists the moment it...Read more
Freedom to Operate Conundrum
Growing a patent portfolio by protecting the innovation derived from research and development investment is merely the beginning to the creation of value. Freedom to use, sell and otherwise...Read more
Pitfalls and the Opportunities of Commercialising and Managing Co-Created Intellectual Property
Intellectual property rights bestow certain rights upon the creator thereof. In particular the right of ownership. In compliance with the Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS) ...Read more
Moral Rights: To Waive or not to Waive The Right of an Employer
The Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS), which came into effect on 1 January 1995, is an international legal agreement between the member nations of the...Read more
Licencing of Patent Applications - Pre-Grant Royalty Earning
Research and development is costly. International patent portfolios even more so. The business strategy of most corporations, when filing a patent application, is to seek some return on R&D investment,...Read more