As head of the IP Disputes Section of the World Intellectual Property Organization’s Arbitration and Mediation Center, Heike Wollgast oversees the administration of WIPO mediation, arbitration, and expert determination cases, and leads legal and policy developments relating to WIPO Alternative Dispute Resolution. This includes the development of ADR schemes adapted to specific industry sectors, as well as ADR collaborations with IP authorities and courts globally.
Ms. Wollgast has been at WIPO for 25 years. Prior to joining the Arbitration and Mediation Center in 2012, she also held positions in WIPO’s Building Respect for IP Division and as an advisor to the Office of the WIPO Deputy Director General.
She is a German lawyer and holds a Ph.D. in European Law from the University of Cologne. Before joining WIPO, she practised in the Berlin office of the law firm Luther.
Our latest podcast episode, released today, features an interview with Ms. Wollgast about the advantages of using alternative dispute resolution (ADR) in patent litigation and the different tools available to (standard-essential patent) SEP owners and SMEs alike.
She discusses the WIPO mediation pledge, an initiative that sees major SEP holders pledge to SMEs selling and manufacturing IoT devices that they will use mediation to resolve impasses in SEP licensing negotiations (November 21, 2025 ip fray article), and how companies have engaged with and/or reacted to it so far.
She also breaks down the number of SEP mediations and arbitrations that have taken place under WIPO’s auspices.
ADR is an increasingly important topic to ip fray.
We have interviewed people about it on the podcast before, including Christian Loyau, who was previously Director of Legal & Governance at ETSI and was involved with the drafting of the ETSI IPR Policy, and Richard Vary, partner of Bird & Bird and formerly head of litigation at Nokia (November 4, 2024 ip fray article). We also interviewed Aleš Zalar, head of the UPC’s Patent Mediation and Arbitration Center (PMAC) ahead of its launch this year (October 18, 2024 ip fray article). Since its launch, we have also kept a close eye on the PMAC’s movements (July 24, 2026 ip fray article), and follow cases that have explored ADR keenly (June 11, 2026 ip fray article). Our coverage of ADR encompasses policies in China (June 16, 2026 ip fray article) and Japan (May 24, 2026 ip fray article), too.
You can find the recording on Spotify:
The planning and production of this podcast were supported by Ericsson, but Ms. Wollgast voiced only her own and independent opinions.