First and foremost, we present the 2021 IP Office Innovation Ranking, which analyses 60 leading IP offices in terms of the non-core tools and services that they offer. Representatives from WIPO and the EUIPO both delve into how greater cooperation between trademark agencies is needed and what that should look like, while the chief executive of the IP Office of Singapore (IPOS) expands on the organisation’s journey from administrative registry to ‘innovation agency’. Elsewhere, the former head of the Intellectual Property Office of Chile sheds light on unexpected breakthroughs in innovative services that arose from the upheaval caused by covid-19.