When it comes to infringement of patents, the doctrine of equivalence has gained some more attention in the last few years in German courts and indeed also in some of my earlier posts on this blog (see here). In this context, two decisions of the Federal Court of Justice (Bundesgerichtshof) in 2011 have set up…
There has been some confusion in Germany as to whether exhibiting products and services on a trade show qualifies as an infringing act or not. Most prominently, two decisions of the German Federal Court of Justice (Bundesgerichtshof, BGH) have denied a general rule that any presentation of goods or services on a trade show justifies…
In its decision Digitalblock (digital block) the Higher Regional Court of Düsseldorf (Oberlandesgericht Düsseldorf) has discussed the question whether “sleeping” features of a device can cause patent infringement (judgement of 19 February 2015, docket No. I-15 U 39/14). The case was about set-top boxes for receiving free-to-air and encrypted television signals. The patent concerned a…
About half a year ago I reported on new developments in German case law concerning the doctrine of equivalence (see http://kluwerpatentblog.com/2014/10/10/news-about-the-doctrine-of-equivalence-in-german-case-law/). Just at the beginning of this month my colleague Bernward posted about further developments (see http://kluwerpatentblog.com/2015/03/02/8966/). Now again, there is a recent decision of the German Bundesgerichtshof (Federal Court of Justice) dealing with the…
The doctrine of equivalence has seen some kind of renaissance in German case law recently. In short words, there are three questions to be asked to decide for equivalent infringement if there is no literal infringement. The first one being the question about the effect of the different solution. Do the means used to solve…
Just recently, the judgement of the German Federal Court of Justice (Bun-desgerichtshof, BGH) in re X ZR 31/11 concerning a tyre removal machine has been published. This judgement is of relevance as the Federal Court of Justice had to answer a question of claim construction relevant in infringement and nullity proceedings likewise. The relevant question…
In its decision “Fahrradkurbeleinheit” (“bike crank assembly”) the Higher Regional Court of Düsseldorf has lifted an injunction by the Regional Court of Düsseldorf on appeal (OLG Düsseldorf, I-2 U 78/12, 20 June 2013). Contrary to the first instance the court did not find for patent infringement. Questions of literal and equivalent infringement have been discussed…
The German Federal Court of Justice (Bundesgerichtshof, BGH) addressed some interesting questions on patents protecting methods relating to data in the decision “MPEG-2-Videosignalcodierung” (“MPEG-2 video signal encoding”), judgement of 21 August 2012, X ZR 33/10. This all was round up by explanations on patent exhaustion in the context of test purchases. In simple terms, the…
As Christmas is coming closer, the “where is the Christmas stand?”-question comes up again. This little piece of engineering only used once a year is not only subject matter of several patents but has kept the Higher Regional Court of Düsseldorf busy, too (docket No. I-2 U 84/03). Who could imagine that a Christmas stand…
About a month ago Rüdiger Pansch reported on the new “General Terms and Conditions” of the Regional Court of Munich in patent infringement matters (http://kluwerpatentblog.com/2012/03/20/patent-chambers-of-munich-district-court-decree-general-terms-and-conditions/). Now, also the Regional Court of Düsseldorf has put more elaborated advice for the parties in writing. In general, this new procedural order more or less goes along the well-established…
