Under the auspices of the Max Planck Institute for Innovation and Competition (Munich) 40 researchers from 25 countries passed a “Declaration on Patent Protection”. This declaration was published in connection with the 20th anniversary of the TRIPs Agreement. The authors of the declaration state that over the past decades, the autonomy of nation states to…
Earlier today, the Swiss Federal Courts (including the Swiss Federal Patent Court) published a joint press release concerning their annual reports 2013. The number of infringement and/or validity cases submitted to the Federal Patent Court in its second year of operation corresponds to the expectations. In total, 22 ordinary proceedings on the merits and 11 summary proceedings were brought…
The wording of prayers for relief in patent infringement proceedings remains a hotly debated issue in Switzerland. In a landmark decision dated 2004 (BGE 131 III 70) the Swiss Federal Supreme Court ruled that the patent infringing goods or procedures had to be exactly described in the prayers of relief of a cease-and-desist order. Since…
In a recent decision (case no. 4A_142/2013), the Swiss Federal Supreme Court had to decide whether one of the non-permanent judges of the Swiss Federal Patent Court, a Swiss patent attorney, was obliged to recuse himself due to activities of one of his colleagues in his patent law firm in connection with a trademark matter…
Ex parte measures are rather difficult to obtain in patent matters in Switzerland (except from evidence-protection measures). Nevertheless, the Swiss Federal Supreme Court had the opportunity to opine on this subject in a recent decision dated 21 August 2013. Although this case will become better known because it was the first time that the first…
Earlier this year the Federal Patent Court published its annual report for the business year 2012. The report provides an overview of the businesses and procedures during the new Swiss Patent Court’s first year. The number of cases which was submitted to the Federal Patent Court in its first business year corresponded to the expectations….
In a recent decision (case no. 4A_443/2012) the Swiss Federal Supreme Court had to deal with a dispute between the German Robert Bosch GmbH, which filed suit against the Swiss Federal Confederation based on the Swiss portion of EP 0 741 373. The decision exclusively focuses on the question whether the Swiss Federal Patent Court has jurisdiction…
Ensuring the independence and integrity of its judges is crucial for every court system. After its first year of existence, the Swiss Federal Patent Court has slightly amended its Guidelines on Independence for the part-time judges of the Federal Patent Court. However, those guidelines have proven to be very useful in practice. It is interesting…
In a recent decision the new Swiss Federal Patent Court confirmed that it adheres to the case law with regard of the wording of prayers for relief in Swiss patent proceedings. Unlike in other jurisdictions, plaintiffs in Swiss patent proceedings must be very careful if they just adopt the wording from their patent claims in…
In a decision dated 14 June 2012, the Swiss Federal Patent Court granted a patent holder’s request for preliminary taking of evidence by means of the creation of a precise description of an allegedly infringing process. The Patent Court ordered that the description shall be carried out at defendant’s premises by a technically trained judge…
