Prof. Ben Sihanya, Scholar-in-Residence at the University of Nairobi Law School, is an academic, researcher and consultant with extensive expertise in intellectual property (IP) law, constitutionalism and related legal fields. He is founder and CEO of Innovative Lawyering & Sihanya Mentoring, a legal consulting and research firm based in Nairobi.

Sihanya obtained his JSD from Stanford Law School, and has served as Dean of Law, and as Chair of the Department of Commercial Law, at the University of Nairobi. He has been engaged on numerous occasions by branches of the Government of Kenya, including the Directorate of e-Strategy in the Office of the President, the Ministry of Education, the Attorney-General’s Office, the Ministry of Justice and Constitutional Affairs, the Kenya National Commission on Human Rights, and the Committee of Eminent Persons on Constitutional Review.

He is Chair of the Kenyan Copyright Tribunal, and a former member of the Kenya Copyright Board. In 2011, he was appointed to Kenya’s national Task Force on Education, mandated to align education to the Constitution of 2010. Sihanya has consulted to several intergovernmental and international organisations, including the WTO, WIPO, UNDP, UNESCO, the East African Community and Consumers International.

Sihanya joined Open AIR at its inception in 2011, and researched and authored a case study published in 2014 as Reflections on Open Scholarship Modalities and the Copyright Environment in Kenya.