John Syekei

John Syekei has had numerous citations as one of the leading Intellectual Property lawyers in Kenya and the East African region from international legal directories. John has recently been ranked in the Gold Band by WTR 1000, 2015. He was also ranked by WTR 1000 in 2013 and 2014 in the same Gold Band category. Chambers recognised John as a leading lawyer while Managing IP ranked him as an IP star in 2014 and 2015. Both these are highly regarded within the IP world. Under John’s supervision, Coulson Harney won IP Team of the Year at the prestigious African Legal Awards in 2015.

John has a wide and varied IP practice and has handled major trademark, patent, design and copyright disputes before the High Court and Court of Appeal as well as opposition and cancellation matters before the Registrar of Trademarks and the Industrial Property Tribunal. He also advises clients on commercial IP (licensing and franchising), promotions, betting, lotteries, technology and e-commerce, advertising law and counterfeit actions (search and seizure raids). John runs a very busy filing practice (trademarks, designs and patents) across Africa.

Some representative clients include IBM, Diageo, Google, Visa, Philip Morris, Bimeda Pharmaceutical PLC, Safaricom, Bharti Airtel, Proctor & Gamble, Philips Healthcare, Cipla Kenya Limited, Liquid Telecommunications, Cowbell International Inc, Sony Corporation, Red Bull GmbH, 24.com, ADIDAS GmbH, Vestergaard Frandsen Group SA, MIH East Africa, UAP Holdings Ltd and Kopo Kopo Inc.

John is a member of International Federation of Industrial Property Attorneys (FICPI), International Trademark Association (INTA) and International Bar Association (IBA).