Takuya IZUMI

Professional Experience

Mr. Izumi is a patent attorney and the Director of the Global Operations Department. He brings his extensive experience as a director, administrative judge, and examiner at the Japan Patent Office (JPO) to his patent practice. Prior to joining SUGIMURA, he had worked for the JPO, where he served as a director for Visual System, Audio Systems, and Medical Imaging, as a patent judge at Amusement Machinery and Materials Analysis, and as a patent examiner at Business Machinery and Medical Imaging. On top of the experience at the JPO, he was the first IP attaché to the US West Coast under the title of Senior Director, NEDO Silicon Valley Office. He has successfully completed an AI governance project and drafted AI Governance Guidelines in his role as Director for Information Policy Making at the Ministry of Economy, Trade, and Industry. He was also engaged in the WTO/TRIPS, WTO/TBT and FTA/EPA IP Chapter including Trans-Pacific Partnership.

Education

M.S. Science (Earth and Planetary Science), The University of Tokyo
LL.M., The George Washington University Law School

Practice Areas

Patent Prosecution (Optical and Electrical Engineering)

Languages

English (Full professional proficiency)
Japanese (Native)

Publications

• Koji Sugimura, Mitsukuni Terada and Takuya Izumi, A comparison of healthtech regulatory issues in North Asia, Asia Business Law Journal (2024)
• Koji Sugimura and Takuya Izumi, Japan’s IP trends in the age of distributed economic and knowledge activities, The Patent Lawyer July/August 2023 (2023)
• Takuya Izumi, How to Understand the AI Regulation proposed by the European Commission, Robot, No. 262 (2021) (Japanese)
• Takuya Izumi, Understand Silicon Valley as It is, Intellectual Property Management, Vol. 70, No. 4 (2020) (Japanese)
• Suzanne Harrison and Takuya Izumi, IP Management, Business Mindset and IP Community - Think outside the Box, Intellectual Property Management, Vol. 70, No. 2 (2020) (Japanese)
• Translation of Justifying Intellectual Property by MERGES, ROBERT P. Keiso Shobo (2017) (Translating with Munekuni Yamane and Ken Maeda)
• Takuya Izumi, Multilateral Review of Specific Trade Concerns, Houritsu Jiho, Vol 84, No. 10 (2012) (Japanese)
• Takuya Izumi, The Debate over the CAFC is Revived - Focusing on the Exclusive Jurisdiction, Tokugikon No. 252 (2009) (Japanese)
• “Solicitation of third-party opinions under the Japanese amicus brief system increases attention to patent practice in the medical field”
  The Patent Lawyer September/October 2024, p. 69, 2024
• “Japan: AI becomes key focus as patent office streamlines prosecution processes”
  The Patent Prosecution Review 2025, IAM, September 2024
• “A comparison of healthtech regulatory issues in North Asia: Japan”
  Asia Business Law Journal 2024
• ”Japan’s IP trends in the age of distributed economic and knowledge activities”
  The Patent Lawyer July/August 2023, p. 60, 2023

Seminar, etc.

• IAM Connect: AI IP 2022 (May 2022) (Panelist)
• 5G Techritory, High Risk AI (Nov 2020) (Panelist)
• IP Counsel Café, Foreign Prosecution: Considering Different Countries & Cost Cutting Strategies (May 2019) (Panelist)
• SVIPLA, Practical Tips for a Winning Patent Strategy in Japan - Update on Japanese Patent Landscape and How to Make the Most of It (Feb 2018) (Panelist)
• IP Utilization viewed from Silicon Valley - Innovation, Business and Human Resources, Institute of Intellectual Property (Sep 2017) (Japanese)