Under the legal principle of forfeiture of claims a patentee can deprive himself of claims for patent infringement if he asserts them in legal proceedings at such a late stage (time factor) that the infringer from an objective perspective could trust that he would not anymore be subjected to the claims and has made dispositions…
By Bernward Zollner Every now and then it is suggested that a picture or pictures be incorporated in a mo-tion of a complaint against the defendant requesting defendant to cease and desist from a certain activity (being a patent or a copyright infringement) so that defendant’s activity by described more clearly. A recent decision of…
by Stefan Lieck Based on the act for simplification and modernization of Patent Law (“Patentrechts-modernisierungsgesetz”) patent nullity proceedings in Germany have been reformed fundamentally in order to accelerate the appeal proceedings significantly. Therefore, the Federal Patent Court (“Bundespatentgericht”) that is responsible in the first instance shall determine the facts of the case exclusively whereas the…
by Stephan von Petersdorff-Campen Under section 7 (1) of the Law on Employee Inventions (ArbErfG), all the rights in an invention made by an employee in the context of his employment relationship pass to the employer by virtue of law as soon as the employer announces his claim to the invention. With its “Initialidee” (Initial…
by Hetti Hilge The District Court Cologne made some interesting remarks on the requirements of a seizure by the police on a trade show (decision of 6 May 2013, 116 QS 12/13 an, 116 Js 788/12). Under German law, a willful patent infringement constitutes a criminal act so that the public prosecution and the police…
A recent decision of the Higher Regional Court (Oberlandesgericht) Düsseldorf now confirms that a holding company cannot easily dive away under the patent infringing activities of its subsidiaries. Background Many companies are designed in the form of a group, having a holding company at the top and a number of subsidiaries which are directly or…
by Rüdiger Pansch for rospatt osten pross Assuming that “it is sensible for national courts at least to learn from each other and to seek to move towards, rather than away from, each other’s approaches” (Lord Neuberger, Schütz vs Werit, House of Lords judgment of 13 March 2013 at no. 40, [2013] UKSC 16) how…
by Miriam Büttner On 21 January 2013 we already reported on the decision of the German Federal Supreme Court (BGH) regarding the validity of German patent no. 197 56 864, the so-called “Brüstle-patent”, which concerns the protection of neural precursor cells, a pro-cedure to cultivate these cells and the usage of these cells in therapies…
by Bernward Zollner The term “offering” must be understood in a broad sense. It is sufficient that the per-son who is offering draws the attention of the public to the offered object so that – clearly – advertisements or brochures can be qualified as an offer in the sense of the patent statute. In this…
by Stefan Lieck In a judgement of 17 January 2013 (docket no. I-2 U 87/12), the Düsseldorf Higher Regional Court confirmed its previous case law according to which the issuance of a preliminary injunction against generic companies based on patent law is possible under less stringent conditions. According to the case law of the Düsseldorf…
