Broadly, no. That said, in the case of voluntary administration and/or receivership, the insolvent party (especially if it is the licensor) could be compelled by the solvent party (especially if it is the licensee), through injunctive relief, to continue to perform the license.
In a liquidation scenario, a liquidator has wider statutory powers to disclaim a license agreement. Such a disclaimer is highly unlikely to be interfered with by the courts.Any protections for a licensee to use licensed IPR in the event a licensor becomes insolvent should be covered in the license agreement. A licensee, when dealing with an insolvent licensor, should commence negotiations with the insolvency appointees in respect of any interim arrangements (during the course of the insolvency proceedings).
As discussed above, the insolvency of a licensor does not automatically invalidate a license agreement. Further, the insolvency appointees may have no intention of terminating the license pending sale of the business, meaning that the licensee can continue to use the licensed IPR during and potentially after the sale. The insolvency appointees may want to sell the licensed IPR to the licensee.
For completeness, it should be noted that a common approach is for the licensee to seek to have security over the IPR from the licensor.Generally, yes. An insolvency appointee has no right to sell or transfer the licensor's licensed IPR to a third party unless he or she has obtained consent from the licensor. Even if the license has been used as collateral, the consent of the licensor would be required to dispose of that collateral.
In theory, it is possible that a licensee grants a security interest over the IP license in favor of a third party (for instance, a bank) as security for financing. This means that the third party, with a validly registered security interest over the license, could potentially appoint a receiver to sell or transfer the license without obtaining consent from the licensor, and retain the proceeds. However, Australian license agreements generally contain provisions that prevent transfers without the consent of the licensor.