The 17th Baltic IP Conference titled "The Baltic States in Uniting Europe" took place from 5 to 7 November, 2003 Tallinn, the capital of Estonia, and was organized by the Estonian National Group of AIPPI in collaboration with the Estonian Association of Patent Attorneys.

The key-topics included among others:

• IP in the European Union. What shall be centralized, what shall remain in the domain of the member-states;
• developments in the European Patent Convention;
• the balance between supranational and national interests in IP;
• the experience of small countries already operating the European system of IP protection.