Rui is the Head of the Patent Department at J Pereira da Cruz. He has wide experience in prosecution, supporting clients from different geographies to obtain their rights in Europe and beyond, and handling oppositions and appeals. Furthermore, Rui is experienced in providing support in infringement and validity court proceedings, as well as freedom to operate opinions and other IP activities of relevance for business management and strategy.
He obtained his qualification as a Portuguese Patent Attorney (Portuguese Industrial Property Agent) in 2015, and in 2017 he completed the European Qualifying Examination, becoming a European Patent Attorney.
Prior to developing his career in private practice, he entered the IP area as a Patent Examiner at the Portuguese Industrial Property Office, where he worked for three years and co-authored the still valid Guide of the IPO on Computer-Implemented Inventions. Previously, while working on his PhD, Rui worked as an R&D Engineer, in the area of Industrial Instrumentation, developing wireless solutions better adapted to the industrial environment, when the wireless sensor networks and the Internet of things were starting to rise.
Rui is currently the President of the Patents Commission of Union-IP, the UNION of European Practitioners in Intellectual Property, as well as a member of the Patents Commission of the Portuguese Association of Intellectual Property Consultants (ACPI) and a member of the Portuguese Association of European Patent Attorneys (AMEP) and of the Portuguese delegation of AIPPI. Through ACPI, he has been involved in one of the working commissions which proposed several of the amendments which resulted in the current IP Code (2018).
He is also an Associate Professor at the University Lusófona of Lisbon, teaching IP in a graduate course, a tutor in the Lisbon Basic training in European Patent Law of the Center for International Intellectual Property Studies (CEIPI), and he provides training for EQE candidates in the Candidate Support Project of the EPO and the epi. He acts before the Portuguese IPO (INPI), EPO, WIPO and EUIPO.
Year Joined Firm: 2014
Education/Alumni: PhD in Physics, University of Coimbra, 2013
Network Memberships: epi, Union-IP, AIPPI, ACPI, AMEP
Last updated 30th October 2020
