Mr John McKnight > Spoor & Fisher > Pretoria, South Africa > Lawyer Profile

Mr John McKnight

+27 11 994 5102 j.mcknight@spoor.com View profile View profile View profile View profile

Work Department

Patent Chemical

Position

John is a partner at Spoor & Fisher. He deals with domestic and international patent and design matters, including the preparation and prosecution of patent and design applications. John specialises in the filing of applications in the chemical, biochemical and pharmaceutical fields, and related litigation. He also has experience in commercial transactions involving IP, including confidentiality, joint development, supply, licencing and technology transfer agreements. As a former Deputy Head of Patents at Reckitt Benckiser in the UK, John has particular experience of both registered and unregistered IP rights in a FMCG environment.

Career

John graduated with a BSc majoring in Chemistry and Biochemistry in 1990.  In 1995 he graduated LLB from the University of South Africa.  He graduated with honours in Biochemistry from the University of Johannesburg in 1997.

John began his articles with a firm of patent attorneys in Pretoria in 1992 and was admitted as an attorney in 1995 (with right of appearance in the High Court in 1996).  He was registered as a South African Patent Attorney in 1997.

In that same year he relocated to the United Kingdom to join the in-house patent team at Reckitt & Colman (as it was then known).  Following further study John was registered as a Chartered Patent Attorney in 2000, a Solicitor of England and Wales in 2002 and a European Attorney also in 2002.

John served as a Deputy Head of Department at Reckitt Benckiser until he returned to South Africa to take up the offer of partnership with Spoor & Fisher in 2004.

Professional activities

Author of chapters on Practical Law in Cross Border Commercial Transactions (Thomson Reuters), 2018.

Lecturer for LLM students: University of Johannesburg, 2019/

Appointed as Professor of Practice at the Faculty of Law at University of Johannesburg.

He also lectured on the Certificate in Patent Administration Course run by CIPA in the UK.

Market Recognition

Chartered Institute of Patent Attorneys (CIPA) Gill Prize 2000. (The Gill Prize is awarded to the person achieving the highest cumulative marks in the final round of examinations for qualification as a UK patent attorney).

Listed in IAM’s Wold’s Leading Patent Practicioners in 2011 – 2020.

Languages

English 

Memberships

Fellow of the Chartered Institute of Patent Agents (CIPA). 

Fellow of the South African Institute of Intellectual Property Law (SAIIPL).

Member of the Law Society of England and Wales and of the Institute of Professional Representatives before the European Patent Office.

Member of the Law Society of South Africa (LSSA).

Member of the Licensing Executive Society (LES).

Member of the International Federation of Intellectual Property Attorneys (FICPI).

Member of the Intellectual Property Regulation Board (IPReg).

Member of the Legal Practice Council (LPC).

Education

BSc (Chem and Biochem), BSc (Hons) (Biochem), LLB. Attorney of the High Court of South Africa, Chartered Patent Attorney, European Patent Attorney, Solicitor of England and Wales (non-practising).

Leisure

Reading, watching films and listening to music