Masahiro Koezuka resigned as commissioner of the Japan Patent Office (JPO) on July 11. Takashi Suzuki has replaced him in the top JPO job.
In his inauguration address, Suzuki said that his priorities would be to promote worksharing initiatives and aggressively take action against counterfeit products. He also said that the JPO plans to introduce a “super accelerated” examination system to speed up the processing of some patent applications.
Suzuki joined the Ministry of International Trade and Industry in 1973. After working in a number of different posts, he was appointed director-general of the Economic and Industrial Policy Bureau at METI in July 2006.
Koezuka is still working at the JPO as an advisor to the commissioner.