Frantzeska Papadopoulou Skarp

Frantzeska Papadopoulou Skarp is an affiliated Professor at the Department of Clinical Neuroscience KI and a Professor of Intellectual Property Law at Stockholm University, with a scholarly focus on the intersection of patent law, pharmaceutical regulation, and innovation policy. She serves as the Director of IFIM (Institute for Intellectual Property and Market Law) and co-leads the LL.M. in European Intellectual Property Law. 

Her research explores how legal frameworks surrounding exclusive rights—especially supplementary protection certificates (SPCs), orphan drug designations, and regulatory data protection—affect innovation incentives, public health, and access to medicines.

Her work critically examines the strategic use of pharmaceutical patents, often referred to as “evergreening, ” where companies extend market exclusivity through layered intellectual property and regulatory protections. Through empirical legal research and policy analysis, she investigates how these mechanisms influence competition, pricing, and sustainability in European and global healthcare markets.

One of her central contributions is in understanding regulatory rights as quasi-IP tools that complement or exceed patent protection. Her research interrogates how these tools are used to create de facto monopolies and how legal interpretations—especially from the CJEU—shape their limits and legitimacy.

Her doctoral thesis, Opening Pandora’s Box, laid the groundwork for her interest in legal pluralism, access to knowledge, and the tension between proprietary rights and public interest, a theme that continues in her pharmaceutical work. More recent publications delve into the balance between innovation and affordability in health systems, particularly in the context of EU law.

Beyond doctrinal and theoretical analysis, Papadopoulou Skarp actively engages in interdisciplinary research, linking IP law with public health, ethics, and market regulation. She has contributed to several cross-disciplinary projects and policy discussions, including on the implications of intellectual property in the post-pandemic landscape and the reform of the European pharmaceutical legislation.

Frantzeska Papadopoulou Skarp is an experienced legal educator with a broad teaching portfolio in intellectual property law, particularly in the fields of patents, pharmaceutical law, and innovation policy. As a Professor of Intellectual Property Law at Stockholm University, she has taught at undergraduate, postgraduate, and professional levels.

She is the Co-Director of the LL.M. in European Intellectual Property Law, a leading international program that attracts legal professionals and scholars from around the world. In this role, she designs and delivers advanced-level courses on EU patent law, regulatory exclusivities, biotech and pharmaceutical IP, and the interplay between IP rights and competition law. 

At the undergraduate level, she teaches foundational IP law within civil law curricula, including Civil Law B and Swedish Law in Context. These courses are often taken by students without prior IP exposure, and she has developed pedagogical strategies to make IP law accessible, engaging, and socially relevant for a general legal audience.

Frantzeska also has substantial experience teaching non-lawyers, including students and professionals from disciplines such as film, media, life sciences, and political science.