MIPDaL IP and Data Law Master's 2027 — Erasmus Mundus
Fully funded Master scholarship in Germany for All international students students 2027
Two-year Erasmus Mundus master's in intellectual property and data law, taught across Germany, France, Estonia, Spain and the UK. Scholarship deadline 15 January 2027.
Eligibility
- Law degree or a degree with substantial legal content worth at least 240 ECTS (four-year bachelor, or three-year bachelor plus a first master's)
- Law-adjacent degrees such as criminology may qualify where legal content is demonstrable
- English at CEFR C1 with a listed certificate; B2 plus accepted only in exceptional cases
- French at C1 for the Strasbourg track, Spanish at B2 for the Spanish track
- The two countries of study must differ from your country of residence at the time of enrolment
- Final-year students may apply once 80 per cent of credit points are proven
- No previous Erasmus Mundus joint master's scholarship
Intellectual property law has become a data law problem. A patent dispute now turns on training datasets, a licensing contract turns on where a model was hosted, and a trademark case turns on what an algorithm surfaced to a buyer in Frankfurt. MIPDaL, the Erasmus Mundus Master in Intellectual Property and Data Law, was built for that overlap, and its 2027/2028 intake opened on 1 October 2026.
The programme is taught by a consortium of six universities in Germany, France, Estonia, Spain and the United Kingdom, coordinated from TU Dresden, and it runs for two years across at least two of those countries. That mobility is not decoration: it is the reason the degree is portable, and it is also the first rule that removes applicants before anyone reads their motivation letter.
What it covers
The curriculum splits intellectual property from data regulation and then forces them back together. You study the classic instruments — patents, trademarks, copyright, design rights — alongside data protection, platform regulation and the trade-secret questions that appear when a company's most valuable asset is a database rather than a machine. Three specialisation tracks let you weight the degree towards markets and corporations, towards public and international law, or towards innovation and intellectual property.
The teaching languages follow the study path rather than the whole cohort: English throughout, with French required if your track includes Strasbourg and Spanish if it includes the Spanish partner. That detail matters more than applicants expect. A candidate with a strong English file and no French can still be admitted, but not to the Strasbourg path, and the track you name in your statement is the track the committee assesses you against.
Who can apply
The academic threshold is concrete. You need a law degree, or a degree with substantial legal content, worth at least 240 ECTS — a four-year bachelor, or a three-year bachelor plus a first master's. Degrees in law-adjacent fields such as criminology can qualify if the legal content is demonstrable. English is required at C1, with B2 plus accepted only in exceptional cases, and the consortium states plainly that in recent cycles only applicants with a first-class degree and C1 English have had a realistic chance of a scholarship.
There is a second, structural condition. The two countries in which you study must not be identical to the country where you were resident at the time of enrolment. That is an Erasmus Mundus mobility rule, and it is checked on documents, not on your word.
Run this self-check before you open the portal. Does my transcript show at least 240 ECTS of law, or can I show a bachelor plus a master? Can I prove C1 English with a certificate the consortium lists, not with a medium-of-instruction letter? Which two countries would I actually study in, and does that satisfy the mobility rule given where I live now? Do I have a certified translation of my diploma ready this month? And if the scholarship does not come, can I fund EUR 11,990 for the first year?
That last question is worth answering honestly. MIPDaL charges EUR 9,990 a year to European and UK students and EUR 11,990 a year to non-European students, and there is a separate top-up fee for the semester spent at Queen Mary University of London or the University of Exeter — currently GBP 20,050 and GBP 12,000. Scholarship holders are exempt from both, which is why the scholarship is worth far more than the living allowance attached to it.
The deadline
The application window opened on 1 October 2026. Anything intended for scholarship consideration, and anything applying as an early bird, must be complete by 15 January 2027. All other applicants have until 15 March 2027, and late applications run to 15 June 2027.
The distinction between those three dates is real. The consortium funds up to 12 students a year, roughly 60 across five cohorts, and only files complete by 15 January enter the scholarship ranking. A file submitted in March is assessed for a self-funded place. In the 2026/2027 cycle the consortium received 541 scholarship applications for those twelve places, so the January date is not a soft target.
There is one further filter worth knowing about. Erasmus Mundus rules cap how many scholarships may go to a single nationality across the five cohorts — no more than 10 per cent. A strong applicant from a large applicant pool can be ranked highly and still be placed on a reserve list. Applying early does not change that rule, but it does mean you are ranked in the round where the reserve list is shortest.
How to apply
Applications go through the online portal linked from the admission page. Have these ready: diploma and transcript with certified English translations, a grading-system explanation if your transcript does not carry one, English language certificate, CV, motivation letter, and — for the French or Spanish tracks — evidence of that language. The consortium also asks for a document set that shows where you have lived, because the mobility rule is assessed on residence rather than nationality.
The document that most often derails a file is the grading explanation. A transcript that shows "75 per cent" without a scale cannot be compared to a UK upper second, and the committee is explicit that it reviews each case individually rather than converting mechanically. Attach the university's own scale, and if the university does not publish one, ask the registrar for a one-page statement.
Tips to win
Write the motivation letter for one track, not for the programme. The committee reads hundreds of letters that praise the consortium; what distinguishes a file is a specific legal problem you want to work on — a data-transfer question, a patent thicket in a particular industry, a platform-liability gap — and a reason that problem needs two legal systems rather than one.
Treat the admission clinics as intelligence rather than marketing. MIPDaL runs online sessions on 27 October 2026, 1 December 2026 and 4 January 2027 at 15:00 CET. Asking a direct question about how the committee weights the degree grade against the motivation letter tells you more about your chances than any published statistic.
Common mistakes
Naming a track in the statement and then applying for a different one. Submitting a file in January that is missing the language certificate the chosen track requires. Assuming a three-year bachelor alone satisfies the 240 ECTS requirement. Applying with a residence history that contradicts the mobility rule. And treating 15 June as a scholarship date, when it is only a late self-funded window.
The programme suits applicants who want to practise at the intersection of technology regulation and commercial law, in-house or in a regulator, rather than to research doctrine. If that is you, the January date is the one that matters.
Other scholarships worth comparing on OEAC Network: https://www.oeacnetwork.com/index.php?page=post&id=51 https://www.oeacnetwork.com/index.php?page=post&id=72 https://www.oeacnetwork.com/index.php?page=post&id=46
An OEAC advisor can check your documents and your statement against the programme's own requirements before you submit. Book a free review with the advisory team.
Last updated: 28 October 2026. Source: https://mipdal.eu/admission
Always confirm the deadline and eligibility on the official page before you apply. Scholarship dates change between rounds, and this listing is a summary — the provider's own page is the authoritative source. OEAC Network lists scholarships for free and is not an agent for any university or funding body.
