Despite all uncertainty regarding the future, due to the ongoing Brexit saga and the German constitutional complaint, preparations for the Unitary Patent system are quietly going on. The EPO Select Committee gathered information on national measures accompanying the implementation of the system which was distributed among members of the Committee this summer. Also, the epi…
‘Why Berlin can’t wait for Brexit in matters of UPC’, is the title of a recent article on the website of the German law firm Kather Augenstein. Main point: if the Federal Constitutional Court dismisses the constitutional complaint against the Unified Patent Court Agreement, the German government will have to finish the ratification procedure immediately,…
How do competition law and intellectual property work together? That is the main focus of the book ‘The interplay between competition law and intellectual property’, which was published by Kluwer Law International earlier this year. The book, focusing on sectors such as pharmaceuticals, IT, telecoms, energy and agriculture in eleven of the world’s most active…
Even if the German constitutional complaint against the Unified Patent Court Agreement is dismissed, the German government will not proceed with ratification of the UPCA until the consequences of the Brexit are entirely clear. The German Justice Ministry made this clear in answer to questions of parliament. In a letter earlier this month it stated:…
The Administrative Council of the European Patent Office unanimously adopted the EPO’s Strategic Plan 2023 during the AC meeting earlier this week in Munich. According to an announcement published on the EPO website today, president António Campinos said: ‘This Strategic Plan is a clear vision of how we want our Office to look in the…
A strike at the EPO, which was to be held during the meeting of the Administrative Council in Munich later this week, has been called off. The EPO’s trade union SUEPO had submitted a call for a strike, which would have been the first one since Campinos took office last year, ‘after a rather disappointing…
The future of the Unified Patent Court and the Unitary Patent system may be uncertain, it hasn’t stopped Milan from promoting its ambition to become the seat of London branch of the UPC’s central division, in case this will be relocated due to the Brexit. Later this month Milanese representatives will have a meeting with…
The focus in The Netherlands on the option of compounding medicines as a means to circumvent the use of (expensive) authorised medicinal products of pharmaceutical companies and to pressurize them into lowering their prices, is confusing and possibly misleading and not necessarily good for patients. Attorney-at-law Hanneke Later-Nijland, also a trained pharmacist and a former…
Three years after the last recruitment campaign for legally and technically qualified judges of the Unified Patent Court, the UPC Preparatory Committee has launched a new round of recruitment for UPC judges. An announcement was published on the website of the Preparatory Committee (Prep Com) earlier today. Kluwer IP Law understands the Preparatory Committee had…
The SUEPO trade union has called for a strike in all EPO sites around the next Administrative Council’s meeting in June. ‘Almost one year after the arrival as Mr. Campinos as President of the EPO, we note with regret that the social situation hasn’t improved and that none of the root causes of the many…
