Mohammad Ataul Karim

Mohammad Ataul Karim is a full-time DPhil in Law Researcher and a member of Keble College. He has also been a Graduate Teaching Assistant (GTA) for IP at the Faculty of Law, University of Oxford, since 2023, and an Academic Tutor for the LLM in IP and Competition Law program at the Munich Intellectual Property Law Center (MIPLC) since 2021. 

His DPhil project focuses on transparency in intellectual property (IP). It advocates for and proposes a transparency framework that promotes a more efficient and balanced intellectual property (IP) system, thereby better protecting intellectual property rights (IPRs) and public interests.

Ataul worked as a Consultant at academic institutions and the Executive Program of the WIPO Academy, Geneva, Switzerland. He specifically assisted in IP Teaching in the Asia and Pacific Region and supported WIPO's joint master’s programs in the region. During his tenure, he was a member of the organising team for the WIPO-WTO Colloquium for IP Teachers (2022 edition) and an editor of the WIPO-WTO Colloquium papers, Volume 12 (2021).   

Ataul also worked for a short period in the IPR policy division of Ericsson in Munich, focusing on the value of SEP-protected connectivity standards, FRAND rates, and licensing levels in the automotive sector from an IP and competition law perspective.  He also taught law in Bangladeshi universities.

He holds an LLB (Honours) and an LLM degree from the University of Dhaka, Bangladesh, as well as an LLM in Intellectual Property Law from the WIPO Academy and the Faculty of Law at Ankara University. Later, he pursued an LLM in IP and Competition Law from the Max Planck Institute for Innovation and Competition (MIPLC) in Munich, Germany, where he was a DAAD Scholar (the German Academic Exchange Service) and a GRUR Scholar (the German Association for the Protection of Intellectual Property) for the 2020-21 academic year. 

Ataul remains committed to contributing to the people and society that have provided him with endless support. He is happy to provide mentorship to students, particularly those from humble backgrounds, who are underrepresented, and aspire to be change-makers.