Australia, Case Law, Pharmaceutical patent

, (Clayton Utz)/

Since Warner-Lambert successfully defended its pregabalin patent and obtained injunctions against generic market entry in Apotex Pty Ltd v Warner-Lambert Company LLC (No 2) [2016] FCA 1238 (see our coverage of the case in ‘Carving out the principles: a comparative review of the Australia and UK Lyrica cases’), the Australian Lyrica dispute has continued through…

Australia, Infringement

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In a significant departure from precedent, the Full Federal Court of Australia held in Coretell Pty Ltd v Australian Mud Company Pty Ltd [2017] FCAFC 54 (Coretell) that the entitlement to relief for infringement of an innovation patent begins from the date of the grant of the patent and not the application’s date of filing….

Australia, Damages, Enforcement, Pharma

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The Federal Court of Australia has handed down its first detailed damages decision in a long time in a patent infringement claim against a generic pharmaceutical company. In doing so, it sets a new benchmark for damages claims by innovator companies whose products have been illegally copied. In Bayer Pharma Aktiengesellschaft v Generic Health Pty…

Australia, Extent of Protection, Inventive step, Scope of protection

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Australia ended 2016 flipping through the pages of the Productivity Commission’s final Inquiry Report on Australia’s Intellectual Property Arrangements. In general, the Commission considers that IP rights encourage innovation, but are not always necessary for it and can often be used harmfully. The proposed changes are aimed at balancing the interests of rights holders with…

Australia

, , (Clayton Utz)/

IP Australia has recently published its Exposure Drafts for the Intellectual Property Laws Amendment Bill 2017 and the Intellectual Property Laws Amendment Regulations 2017 for public comment. The amendments aim to “align and streamline the processes for obtaining, maintaining and challenging intellectual property (IP) rights” and to ” reduce the regulatory burden for businesses that…

Australia, Case Law, Pharma, Revocation, Second Medical Use, Sufficiency of disclosure, United Kingdom, Validity

, , (Clayton Utz)/

On 21 October 2016, the Federal Court of Australia handed down its judgment in the case of Apotex Pty Ltd v Warner-Lambert Company LLC (No 2) [2016] FCA 1238 (FCA Judgment).  Justice John Nicholas found in favour of Warner-Lambert, both upholding the validity of its patent claims and granting final injunctions restraining infringement by Apotex….

Australia, PCT

, (Clayton Utz)/

This question was tackled by the Full Federal Court of Australia in Kafataris v Davis [2016] FCAFC 134. The patent in suit related to an alternative manner of playing card games. The player could play a primary game while at the same time exercising betting options on a secondary or auxiliary game, either separately from…

Australia, Pharma

, (Clayton Utz)/

On 9 September 2016, the Full Federal Court of Australia delivered its judgment in Actavis Pty Ltd v Orion Corporation [2016] FCAFC 121 (Actavis).  The proceedings concerned the infringement/revocation of a patent for Stalevo, Novartis’ 3-in-1 Parkinson’s disease drug. A related issue was whether Novartis Pharma AG (Novartis) was the exclusive licensee of Orion’s 765932…

Australia, Extent of Protection, NPE, Scope of protection, Validity

, (Clayton Utz)/

On 22 July 2016, IP Australia approved a patent specification involving computer programming in poker machines in Aristocrat Technologies Australia Pty Limited [2016] APO 49. IP Australia’s decision comes on the heels of the High Court of Australia’s approval of the Full Federal Court decision in Commissioner of Patents v RPL Central Pty Ltd [2015]…

Australia

, (Clayton Utz)/

On 24 June 2016, the Full Federal Court of Australia upheld an appeal from a first instance decision which gave a broad construction to an omnibus claim in the case of GlaxoSmithKline Australia Pty Ltd v Reckitt Benckiser Healthcare (UK) Ltd [2016] FCAFC 90. Reckitt’s claim against GSK included allegations of infringement of various claims (including…