Impact Statement:

Richard Gold is Chief Policy and Partnerships Officer at Conscience, a Distinguished James McGill Professor at McGill University, Director and founding director of McGill’s Centre for Intellectual Property Policy, and a Senior Fellow at the Centre for International Governance Innovation.

Throughout his career, Gold has demonstrated a sustained commitment to advancing open science, intellectual property policy, and health innovation through institution building, policy advice, education, and international collaboration. He has worked to develop collaborative approaches to innovation and knowledge sharing, and these efforts have helped create organizations, informed policy, supported institutional initiatives, and improved access to health technologies in Canada and internationally.

One of Gold’s most significant contributions has been the creation of Conscience, a Canadian non-profit organization dedicated to advancing open science and innovation. He played a central role in establishing the organization, including developing the proposal with federal government policymakers, securing pro bono legal services from a major corporate law firm, overseeing incorporation, recruiting leadership, and contributing to branding and organizational development. Prior to Conscience, Gold founded The Innovation Partnership (TIP), a non-profit organization that provided assistance to Indigenous communities, developing countries, and international organizations on intellectual property and health innovation.

Gold’s influence is also evident in efforts to advance open science within research institutions. In 2016, he served as an expert advisor to the Montreal Neurological Institute-Hospital (The Neuro) during its transition toward an open science framework. His contributions included leading consultations with institute members, drafting the Principles and Best Practices for Open Science at The Neuro, advising the Tanenbaum Open Science Institute Leaders Council, and engaging with media outlets, including reporters from Science and Nature.

A further example of Gold’s impact is his work to improve access to health technologies. He advised the leadership of the Children’s Hospital of Eastern Ontario and their legal team in litigation involving patents related to Long QT syndrome testing. This work helped to ensure that Canadians had access to critical genetic testing and resulted in a groundbreaking settlement agreement.

Gold has also made substantial contributions to policy development through advisory work. He served on an expert committee advising the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada (NSERC) on revisions to its intellectual property policy. He also advised Canadian and international companies, as well as organizations including the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO), the World Health Organization (WHO), and Unitaid on intellectual property and health innovation.

Gold led the International Expert Group on Biotechnology, Innovation and Intellectual Property, which released a report in 2008 calling for collaborative approaches to advancing biotechnology development. This group met with policymakers in Washington and Ottawa, and its report received international media coverage in France, the United Kingdom, Brazil, Italy, and Canada.

Gold has consistently contributed to international dialogue on science and innovation through leadership and convening activities. This includes a 20-year+ collaboration with the OECD, where he served as lead drafter of the OECD Guidelines for the Licensing of Genetic Inventions, adopted by the OECD Council in 2006. In April 2026, he organized and led an OECD Workshop on Open Science Innovation Partnerships. He is also organizing a United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) workshop on open science scheduled for fall 2026.

Gold’s expertise has been recognized through invitations to speak at international forums, including the United States National Academy of Sciences and equivalent academies in Canada, the United Kingdom, and China on topics including CRISPR and gene editing. He was also an invited speaker at the 2026 World Conference on Research Integrity (WCRI) on sovereignty and innovation and has contributed to WIPO training workshops in Jamaica, China, and Brazil. In addition, he has trained judges in Canada and France, and across the globe, extending the reach of his expertise beyond academia and research institutions.

Collectively, these accomplishments demonstrate a career dedicated to advancing innovation in the public interest. Through institution building, policy development, education, international collaboration, and efforts to improve access to health innovation, Gold has made meaningful and lasting contributions to science, innovation, education and society in Canada and internationally.

Bio:

Richard Gold brings 35 years of academic and private-sector experience to innovation policy. His legal career advising technology firms laid the foundation for his dual academic and policy trajectory. As Distinguished James McGill Professor at McGill University’s Faculty of Law, Faculty of Medicine and Health Science, and Bieler School of the environment, he serves as Director of the Centre for Intellectual Property Policy, and Chief Policy and Partnerships Officer at Conscience, a nonprofit supporting open science drug discovery. His work addresses a central problem: how governments, firms, and institutions can transform innovative research into social and economic outcomes.