Sergio Alonso de Leon

Dr. Sergio Alonso de Leon joined the Legal Service of the European Parliament in 2013. He currently works in matters pertaining to the parliamentary committee on legal affairs, with focus on the EU’s digital agenda, intellectual property law and, more generally, regulation of emerging technologies. He advises lawmakers throughout the legislative procedure and regularly takes part in interinstitutional negotiations. He has represented the European Parliament in EU courts in numerous cases.

He is a member of the executive team of the recently set up internal network of legal practitioners of Parliament on the topic of the “Rule of Law”.

He was selected as a member of the EU Institutions’ “Young Talent Network” (2017-2019), a select group of young officials based in Brussels active in foresight activities and in exchanging perspective for a big ‘EU picture’.

Before joining Parliament, he practiced law in Spain, working in legal service of the Regional Government of Madrid (Letrado de la Comunidad de Madrid), where he gathered ample experience in litigation.

He holds a Ph.D. (summa cum laude) from University Carlos III (Madrid). His doctoral work “Composite administrative procedures in the EU” received an award for best doctoral research work in the field of European public law and was published as a monograph. He is author of several academic publications and participates frequently in seminars and other outreach activities.

He has a keen interest in assessing and giving solutions to the challenges associated with the regulation and governance of technology, in particular with regard to intellectual property law. The EU is about to pioneer new rules for the emerging technologies, and Sergio wants to fully understand the implications as well as get insights for prospective new legislation. His broader research interests also include the future of the EU institutions, democracy and rule of law.3)

CONTACT: sa6929@nyu.edu

Research Project

Laying down a fertile European intellectual property legal framework for the AI revolution. The EU, as part of its digital agenda, will be pioneer in enacting rules on artificial intelligence (AI), thus trying to steer the societal transformation contemporaneous to this technological revolution. My research focuses on some intellectual property (IP) law aspects, which have so far nor been addressed by the current proposals, but which have the potential to alter significantly the set of incentives for innovation. Data is the main enabler of AI development. IP law impacts the legal configuration of data and affects how easy it is to innovate. In this regard, I intend to carry out my research on two aspects, namely, the legal status of data fed to AI systems and the ownership of AI’s output in terms of creativity and innovation. The normative approach to these elements will pave the way to a landscape where European innovators can thrive without endangering the values and rights we hold so dear, including personal data protection. I find a research aimed at striking this equilibrium both intellectually challenging and with relevant practical implications. The normative path that the EU will take shall shape in no small measure our success in the digital revolution.