James Pooley is the Deputy Director General for Innovation and Technology at the World Intellectual Property Organization in Geneva. WIPO is one of the specialized agencies of the United Nations, and Mr. Pooley is responsible for overseeing operation of the international patent system, as well as programs directed at the development of patent laws and of innovation infrastructure, particularly in developing countries.

Before coming to WIPO, Pooley was a private lawyer in Palo Alto, California, most recently at Morrison & Foerster, where he represented clients in patent, copyright and trade secret litigation. He has also served as an adjunct professor of law at the University of California, Berkeley, as President of the American Intellectual Property Law Association, as President of the National Inventors Hall of Fame, and as a member of the National Academies of Science Committee on IP Rights. Pooley is an author of several major works in the IP field, including his treatise Trade Secrets (Law Journal Press) and the Patent Case Management Judicial Guide (Federal Judicial Center).

James Pooley graduated from Columbia School of Law as a Harlan Fiske Stone Scholar in 1973, and holds a Bachelor of Arts, with honors, from Lafayette College.