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Standards and IPR policy

This policy governs contributions made through The Global Risks Alliance (GRA) to standards work, including the Nexus Standards, and to the texts of GRA industry councils and working groups. The Nexus Standards are an open programme of standards for systemic risk, published by the Global Centre for Risk and Innovation (GCRI Canada) as publisher of record. The policy applies to every contribution GRA receives now, and to every council and working group from its first session. Version of 19 October 2026, effective on that date.

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01Contents

Standards and IPR policy in four parts.

In this dossier4 parts
  1. 01PrinciplesOpen, royalty-free and voluntary
  2. 02PatentsRoyalty-free commitment and disclosure
  3. 03CopyrightWorking texts and other publishers’ standards
  4. 04Antitrust safeguardsRules for meetings of financial institutions
02Principles

Open, royalty-free and voluntary.

Open

Published for all

Published texts are released under CC BY 4.0 and can be read, reused and implemented by anyone.

Royalty-free

No patent toll

Participants license, without royalty, the patent claims essential to the texts they help write.

Voluntary

No one is bound

No one is required to implement a text, and GRA does not certify conformance or exclude anyone for choosing another method.

03Patents

Royalty-free commitment and disclosure.

  1. 01

    Royalty-free commitment

    Each participant that contributes to a text grants everyone who implements the final published text a perpetual, worldwide, non-exclusive, royalty-free licence under its essential claims: the patent claims, owned or controlled by the participant or its affiliates now or later, that are necessarily infringed by implementing the text. Other terms of the licence are reasonable and non-discriminatory. The commitment binds anyone to whom the claims are transferred.

  2. 02

    Disclosure duty

    A participant that knows of a patent or application, its own or another’s, that may contain an essential claim tells the chair and the integrity and conduct concern form in writing as soon as it becomes aware, naming the patent and the part of the text concerned. Disclosure is in good faith; no patent search is required. Disclosures are published with the text.

  3. 03

    Exclusion

    A participant may exclude a specific essential claim from its commitment only by written notice, naming the claim and the text, before the text is published for public comment. The group then decides whether to change the text. Claims that cover text the participant itself contributed cannot be excluded.

  4. 04

    Defensive suspension

    The licence may be suspended for anyone who asserts an essential claim against an implementer of the same text.

05Antitrust safeguards

Rules for meetings of financial institutions.

Participants in GRA councils and working groups compete with one another. These rules apply to every GRA meeting, council, working group, event and exchange of information, and are explained further on antitrust and competition.

  1. 01

    Never discussed

    Prices, fees, premiums, interest rates, spreads, commissions, discounts and wages; underwriting, lending, coverage or other terms offered to customers; bids, tenders, syndicate and allocation decisions; capacity, output, expansion or withdrawal plans; individual customers, suppliers or counterparties.

  2. 02

    Never agreed

    Division of markets, customers, products or territories; collective refusals to deal; collective commitments on which sectors, firms or projects to finance, insure or invest in; hiring and wage arrangements between firms; standards that exclude a competitor without objective reason.

  3. 03

    Information exchange

    Firm-level data is never shared between participants. Industry data enters GRA work only through GRA staff or an independent third party, is historical, and is aggregated across enough firms that no firm can be identified or its position reverse engineered.

  4. 04

    Agendas and minutes

    Every meeting has a written agenda, circulated in advance and checked by GRA’s compliance function, and opens with a reminder of these rules. Items outside the agenda are not taken. Minutes record attendance, topics and decisions, are sent to participants for correction and are kept by GRA. GRA’s legal adviser may attend any meeting.

  5. 05

    Stopping and reporting

    The chair stops any discussion that strays, and any participant may object, leave and ask for the objection to be minuted. Concerns go in confidence to the integrity and conduct concern form and are reviewed outside the meeting concerned. The rules reflect section 1 of the Sherman Act, section 5 of the FTC Act, article 101 of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union, Chapter I of the UK Competition Act 1998 and sections 45 and 90.1 of the Competition Act of Canada.

06Questions

Questions and answers.

What is an essential claim?
A patent claim that cannot be avoided when implementing the published text, because no technically feasible alternative within the text exists. Claims on technology the text does not require, or on how a product is built beyond what the text specifies, are not essential.
Can I paste a clause of an ISO standard into a working text?
No. Cite the standard by number, edition and clause and describe the requirement in your own words. Short quotations are allowed only as far as the law of quotation permits.
Can members compare their prices in a GRA meeting?
No. Prices, fees, rates, terms, bids and plans are never discussed. If a meeting strays, object, ask the chair to stop and report it to the integrity and conduct concern form.
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