WIPO Arbitration and Mediation Center: How a UN Agency Became a Global Platform for Intellectual Property Mediation

There are organizations whose history is so long that it is difficult to believe how contemporary their daily tasks are. The World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) traces its lineage to the Paris Convention for the Protection of Industrial Property of 1883 and the Berne Convention for the Protection of Literary and Artistic Works of 1886 — documents signed in a world of kerosene lamps and the telegraph, long before the advent of the automobile, to say nothing of the internet. Formally, as a specialized agency of the United Nations, WIPO has existed since 1967, and today unites 193 member states with a mandate to develop a balanced and accessible international system for the protection of intellectual property.

This is precisely why the contrast strikes me so forcefully when I think about the division to which this article is devoted — the WIPO Arbitration and Mediation Center. An organization with a century-long conventional heritage proved flexible enough to establish, in 1994, a structure that within five years had begun resolving disputes over internet domain names — a technology that did not exist when the foundational documents of WIPO itself were being written. And what is even more interesting: over its thirty-plus years of existence, the Center has transformed from a niche service for patent lawyers into one of the most versatile mediation platforms in the world, covering literally everything — from disputes over pharmaceutical licenses to conflicts between museums over rights to images of their exhibits.

In this article, I want to examine in detail the mediation aspect of the WIPO Center’s work: how it came about, what categories of disputes it covers, what the procedure looks like in practice, and what distinguishes this Center from the other major players in the field — ICC and CEDR — about which I have already written previously.

The birth of the Center: 1994 and a decision made ahead of its time

The WIPO Center was established in 1994 as an administrative division of WIPO’s International Bureau, pursuant to a decision of the organization’s General Assembly adopted a year earlier, in 1993. Working on the development of the first procedural documents — the WIPO Mediation, Arbitration and Expedited Arbitration Rules — was an international group of recognized experts in arbitration and intellectual property, together with a specially created supervisory board that later transformed into the WIPO Arbitration and Mediation Council. These rules, along with model contractual clauses and submission agreements, entered into force and were published on October 1, 1994.

It is telling that at the very moment of its establishment, the Center received a clearly formulated mission: to offer alternatives to litigation for private parties in commercial disputes involving intellectual property. The WIPO Center is based in Geneva, Switzerland, and since January 2010 has had an additional office in Singapore, in the Maxwell Chambers complex — one of the world’s leading hubs for international dispute resolution. Since 2019, an accredited WIPO Arbitration and Mediation Shanghai Service has been operating, providing arbitration and mediation services for cross-border IP disputes directly in China — a detail that in itself speaks eloquently to how seriously the organization takes its geographic reach.

The Center’s rules have not remained static: in 2007 the WIPO Expert Determination Rules appeared; in 2014 a major update took place, with particular attention to multi-party arbitration and emergency relief; and from January 1, 2016, the current WIPO Mediation Rules gave parties the ability to submit a unilateral request for mediation even in the absence of a prior mediation agreement between them — a step that substantially lowers the threshold for a party genuinely interested in an amicable settlement but lacking a formal clause in its contract.

The Center’s most public product: domain name disputes

When people speak of the WIPO Center, this is the area most frequently mentioned — and not by chance, since it substantially exceeds all others combined in scale. In the late 1990s, when the commercialization of the internet gave rise to the mass phenomenon of cybersquatting — the bad-faith registration of domain names corresponding to others’ trademarks — the United States government asked WIPO to conduct an advisory study and produce recommendations. In April 1999, WIPO presented its report to the newly created organization ICANN (Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers), recommending the introduction of a fast, effective, and inexpensive administrative dispute resolution procedure. ICANN’s board of directors adopted this policy — the Uniform Domain Name Dispute Resolution Policy, UDRP — in August 1999, and in October of the same year approved the procedural rules to accompany it. A month later, in November 1999, the WIPO Center became the first accredited provider of case administration services under the UDRP, and in December of that year received its first case.

That first case merits a separate mention as a good illustration of the spirit of the times: the complaint was filed by the World Wrestling Federation concerning the domain worldwrestlingfederation.com. In the first twelve months of operation, the Center administered 1,857 cases — a figure that at the time must have seemed enormous, but proved to be only the beginning.

Over nearly a quarter century of UDRP practice, the WIPO Center has built up a unique body of precedent: the decision in Telstra Corporation Limited v. Nuclear Marshmallows (WIPO Case D2000-0003, February 2000) remains to this day the most frequently cited precedent among complainants — despite being more than twenty-five years old. The Center has systematized its accumulated practice in its own reference document — the WIPO Jurisprudential Overview, which now exists in its third edition and is freely available online; the vast majority of submissions and decisions in UDRP cases refer to it, effectively transforming an administrative procedure into a kind of “case law” system within a private institution.

The dynamics of recent years show a consistently high and even record-breaking level of demand: in 2023, trademark holders filed a then-record 6,192 cases under the UDRP and national variants of the policy, bringing the total number of cases since the creation of the UDRP to 67,625. In 2024, the figure fell slightly to 6,168 cases filed by trademark holders from 133 countries — but this was still the second most active year in UDRP history, and the linguistic geography of the proceedings (18 languages, from English, in which 91% of cases were conducted, to French, Spanish, Chinese, and even Ukrainian among the top 10) illustrates well the global character of the service. And 2025 again set a new record — 6,282 domain name disputes processed by WIPO. Interestingly, of all 2025 cases, approximately 15% were settled by the parties themselves before a formal decision was issued — meaning that even within what appears to be a purely administrative procedure, the element of voluntary agreement plays a notable role.

I am deliberately devoting so much attention to domain name disputes, even though this article is dedicated to the mediation aspect of the Center’s work: first, because this is the best-known “calling card” of the WIPO Center, which it is worth explaining to the reader at least briefly; and second, because it was precisely the success and effectiveness of this mass, inexpensive, and fast mechanism that built the reputation which then allowed the Center to expand confidently into the realm of classical mediation for more complex commercial IP disputes.

The full spectrum of what the Center mediates

And here begins the main subject of the article — and here, too, is where the most common misconception arises, as if the WIPO Center dealt exclusively with domains or, at best, patent licenses. In reality, the spectrum is far broader, and it is worth setting out point by point, since each of these areas has its own logic and its own audience of users.

Patent disputes. Licensing agreements for patents, disputes concerning the infringement of patent rights — including complex international situations where the same patent is protected simultaneously in several jurisdictions at once. It is precisely here that the cross-border nature of the WIPO Center offers the greatest practical advantage over national courts, allowing the entire dispute to be settled in a single process rather than litigating separately in each country.

Trademark disputes. These are not limited to domain names — the WIPO Center also administers classical commercial disputes: trademark coexistence agreements, where two companies with identical or similar brands agree on the division of markets or fields of use, as well as direct conflicts between holders of similar marks in different territories.

Copyright. Disputes involving publishers, software developers, and representatives of the entertainment industry — film, music, video games — concerning the licensing of works, the distribution of royalties, and the use of content on new platforms.

Information technology and software. Licensing agreements for software, disputes surrounding custom development and IT services outsourcing — a category that in recent years has been growing particularly rapidly in step with the overall development of the technology sector.

Pharmaceuticals and life sciences. A separate and quite substantial area — approximately 15% of the Center’s total caseload by recent estimates. This includes licensing agreements, distribution contracts for pharmaceutical products, and disputes concerning clinical development and research. It is in this category that one of the Center’s most instructive examples lies, to which we will return below.

Research and development agreements. Disputes between companies, universities, or research institutes concerning the terms of joint development and the distribution of rights over research results — a category that naturally overlaps with the pharmaceutical and technology areas.

Industrial designs. Disputes concerning the registration and use of industrial designs, which are traditionally less publicly visible than patent or brand disputes but no less economically significant for industries such as fashion or industrial design.

Arts and cultural institutions. The WIPO Center separately identifies museums and cultural organizations as a category of users of its services — copyright in images of collection exhibits, licensing of reproductions, and rights to use archival materials.

Technology standards and telecommunications. A broader category beyond classical IP, encompassing disputes over standard-essential patents and FRAND licensing issues in the telecommunications industry.

Court referrals. A separate and increasingly important category: national courts around the world are increasingly recommending or directly referring parties to IP disputes to the WIPO Center instead of protracted litigation. This is not an abstract trend — it was precisely in this way that one of the Center’s most instructive mediations began, the description of which follows.

A case that shows the mechanics from the inside: a dispute over an antibody

To avoid keeping the description purely abstract, it is worth examining in detail one real example — a biotech dispute described in detail by the Center itself in its materials and in a dedicated episode of the WIPOD podcast devoted to this very case.

A French and a German company concluded a cooperation agreement for the development of a human antibody for the treatment of a serious disease. Several years after the cooperation began, the French company was acquired by an American corporation. Shortly thereafter, the German side accused the new owner of the French partner of delaying payments due under the agreement and filed a claim for breach of contract in a United States district court. The American corporation responded with a counterclaim. The court proceedings lasted more than a year — until the judge himself suggested that the parties try mediation. The parties agreed and submitted a joint request to the WIPO Center.

What followed was a procedural phase that illustrates well how the Center operates in practice. The parties were unable to agree on a mediator candidate independently, so the standard mechanism under the WIPO Mediation Rules came into play: the Center proposed a list of five candidates with detailed profiles and qualifications, and the parties had seven days to rank them or strike out those unacceptable — silence was treated as consent to all those proposed. An American lawyer specializing in intellectual property with extensive mediation experience was ultimately selected. Following the appointment, the mediator and the parties established a schedule for the submission of brief statements of each party’s positions, interests, and arguments.

The process made active use of caucuses — private meetings between the mediator and one party separately. As a representative of the WIPO Center explained, this technique gives the parties time for reflection, allows them to say things they would be uncomfortable saying in front of the opponent, and gives the mediator additional insights for finding a solution. The mediator’s style combined facilitative and evaluative approaches — meaning that he not only helped the parties structure the conversation around interests but also, where appropriate, shared his own assessment of the strengths and weaknesses of the respective positions. The dispute was settled within six months of the start of mediation — considerably faster than what could have been years of litigation across several jurisdictions, and, no less importantly, with the option of continued cooperation between the parties, which would have been far more difficult to preserve after a win or a loss in court.

This example illustrates well the main difference between mediation and litigation that I emphasize in every article I write on this topic: a court can determine who is right according to the letter of the contract, but only mediation gives the parties a chance to preserve the very possibility of continuing to work together.

What the procedure looks like for first-time users

For those who have never had dealings with institutional mediation, it is useful to understand the basic mechanics of the process under the WIPO Mediation Rules, rather than merely an abstract description of “parties reaching agreement with the help of a neutral party.”

The procedure is typically initiated by a joint submission by the parties (Request for Mediation) or, since 2016, by a unilateral request from one of the parties — in which case the Center approaches the other party with an invitation to join the process. The Center helps the parties select a mediator from its roster, which numbers more than 2,000 practitioners and experts from more than one hundred jurisdictions, with expertise in the areas of patents, trademarks, copyright, industrial designs, and other forms of intellectual property. If the parties cannot agree on a candidate independently, the Center proposes a shortlist, as occurred in the biotech case just described.

The mediation itself is an entirely confidential and non-directive procedure: the mediator does not make decisions but helps the parties find their own. The agreement reached as a result has contractual force for the parties. The Center also administers the financial side of the process — the calculation and apportionment of costs, mediator fees — relieving the parties themselves of the organizational burden. If mediation does not produce a settlement, the WIPO Rules provide for the possibility of a smooth transition to arbitration within the same organization, without the need to begin the search for a new forum from scratch — a detail that makes WIPO virtually unique among specialist IP institutions in offering such continuity.

Recent statistics: a portrait of the Center’s mediation work today

According to the Center’s official data for 2024, within procedures under the WIPO ADR Rules (the combined category of mediation and other forms of ADR distinct from arbitration and domain name disputes), 287 cases were filed, covering a wide spectrum of IP areas: copyright and digital content accounted for 48% of all cases, trademarks for 29%, and patents for 10%. The main business sectors involved in these disputes were the creative industries (collective rights management, video games and esports, the entertainment industry, software), information and communication technologies (including standard-essential patents and FRAND issues in telecommunications), the life sciences (biotechnology and pharmaceuticals), the fashion industry (luxury goods), and R&D and green technologies.

Particularly telling is the following dynamic: over the past five years, the Center recorded a 700% increase in the number of copyright and digital content disputes, including cases filed by users and rights holders against online platforms and search engines — a vivid testament to how rapidly the structure of demand is changing alongside the digital economy itself.

The Shanghai Service mentioned above deserves separate notice: in 2024 it conducted 48 mediations — 30% more than the previous year — primarily in cases referred by the Higher People’s Courts of Shanghai, Fujian, Hainan, Guangdong, and also Chongqing and Sichuan, cooperation with which began in 2024. The Center also concluded new cooperation agreements with the Specialized Intellectual Property Court of the Federal Administrative Justice Tribunal of Mexico and with the Qatar International Court and Dispute Resolution Centre (QICDRC) — both examples showing how actively the Center is building a network of partnerships with national court systems around the world, rather than merely waiting for direct approaches from parties.

Another large, if less publicly visible, line of work is the WIPO ADR Co-administration Program, a joint program with intellectual property and copyright offices of various countries: in 2024, within its framework, the Center supported the settlement of 559 disputes — 53% more than in the previous year.

Returning to the long-term statistics for mediation cases proper (excluding domain name disputes), the Center consistently records a rate of successful settlement of approximately 70% — a figure consistent with global practice at leading mediation institutions and one I have already cited in my articles on CEDR and ICC.

WIPO’s place among the other major players in the field

If one compares the WIPO Center with the two other institutions about which I have already written — CEDR and the ICC International Centre for ADR — the difference in positioning proves quite clear.

CEDR is a center with very specific British roots, deeply embedded in the English civil procedure system and its case law; its history is a history of systematic work with the courts of England and Wales, to the point of influencing the Civil Procedure Rules themselves. The ICC International Centre for ADR is, by contrast, the most “generalist” and geographically dispersed player, with no attachment to any particular industry — a natural consequence of the nature of the International Chamber of Commerce itself as an association of global business as a whole.

The WIPO Center occupies a special place between them: it is the only one of the three institutions with a genuinely narrow subject-matter specialization — exclusively intellectual property and related technological and creative industries. But at the same time, it is the only one of the three centers with a product as mass-market and almost “everyday” as domain name disputes — a service used not only by large corporations but also by small businesses, individual entrepreneurs, and even private individuals protecting their own name or a small brand from cybersquatting. No other center reviewed here can claim a comparable combination of narrow expert specialization in commercial mediation and, at the same time, a mass, practically retail-level service for resolving conflicts that appear mundane at first glance but are economically significant.

For business, the practical conclusion is fairly straightforward: if a dispute concerns a patent, a trademark, copyright, or any other object of intellectual property — the WIPO Center will in all likelihood be the natural first choice, regardless of whether the matter is a mass domain name dispute or a complex multi-million-dollar mediation over a pharmaceutical licensing agreement.

What is most impressive about this story is how consistently an organization founded on diplomatic conventions of the late nineteenth century managed not merely to survive into the age of the internet, but to become one of the principal architects of justice for this new reality. The WIPO Center is not a museum of past diplomatic achievements but a living, constantly growing institution: in a single recent five-year period alone, the number of copyright and digital content disputes increased sevenfold, new categories of cases appeared — such as FRAND licensing or disputes over rights to images of museum collections — and the network of partnerships with national courts continues to expand to new countries and continents.

It is precisely this capacity to combine a century-old reputation as a neutral and authoritative forum with a constant readiness to adapt to new technological and industry realities that I consider the principal lesson of the WIPO Center’s history — and a lesson that is relevant far beyond the narrow field of intellectual property. An organization that once negotiated the protection of industrial designs in the age of steam engines today mediates disputes over the rights to video games and artificial intelligence algorithms — and does so with the same methodical approach it has applied throughout the preceding century.