Introduction
When parties choose arbitration to resolve their IP disputes, there are certitudes to guide them on arbitration law and procedure, and how their case will be handled: the courts will help enforce their arbitration clause; an impartial tribunal will be selected to judge the case without a jury; and the final award will be widely enforceable in the signatory nations of the New York Convention.
[2] But the details of what the particular procedure will be like are often not well known in advance, and in no area are these uncertainties greater than in the procedure the tribunal will adopt for the most important phase of fact-finding in IP and other disputes: disclosure and discovery – that is, the exchange among the parties of relevant documentary and testimonial evidence that can be used to build, or confirm, the legal arguments in the case.