On 25 July 2015, the Spanish Official State Gazette published the text of Act 24/2015, of 24 July 2015, on Patents (“New Patents Act” or “the new Law”), which is due to come into force on 1 April 2017. Although a blog is too short a place to discuss a law that has 186 articles,…
Technological innovation has left deep footprints on the evolution of International Law. In the mid-1960s, in his course at The Hague Academy of International Law, professor Mouton explained that every time inventors conceived a revolutionary invention, politicians had to devise an international organization to take care of it. A classic example is the establishment of…
In a world of increasing legal complexity, it is a common ground – except in Luxembourg – that the lack of specialisation results in the administration of injustice rather than in the administration of justice. The President of Section 15 of the Barcelona Court of Appeal appeared to have this logic in mind when, in…
The legendary deficient regulation of supplementary protection certificates (“SPCs”) has caused the Spanish Patent and Trademark Office (the “SPTO”) and Spanish Courts to struggle as to whether or not the “restitutio in integrum” procedure available to patents is also applicable to SPCs. The High Court of Justice of Madrid, in a recent Judgment of 22…
On 15 October 2014 the Spanish Supreme Court confirmed its earlier rulings on two issues: after an IP right has been found invalid in first instance but the Court of Appeal overturns this decision because it disagrees with the argument that was the basis for invalidity in first instance, (how) should the Court of Appeal…
As announced by the Kluwer UPC News blogger earlier today, this morning the Court of Justice of the European Union (“CJEU”) published its two judgments in cases C-146/13 and C-147/13 where, as expected, it has dismissed the nullity actions filed by the Kingdom of Spain (“Spain”) against Council Regulation (EU) No 1257/2012 (unitary patent) and…
In September of 2013, the Spanish Patents and Trademarks Office (“SPTO”) published a draft Patents Act aimed at modernising the old Act 11/1986, of 20 March, on Patents, which is close to celebrating its 30th anniversary. After hearing the stakeholders concerned, on 11 April 2014 the Council of Ministers approved the draft and sent it…
The OCR (“Old Combination Room”) at Christ College is a lovely, warm and inspiring pine-paneled room located at the heart of one of the most traditional colleges at Cambridge University. For many many decades, like the OCRs of other colleges at Cambridge and at the other leading English university, it has been a place for…
In the blog published on 17 March 2015, we discussed the judgment dated 12 March 2015 of the Court of Justice of the European Union (“CJEU”) handed down in response to the preliminary questions referred by the High Court of Justice (England and Wales), Chancery Division (Patents Court) in a case between Actavis Group EHF,…
On 12 March 2015, the Court of Justice of the European Union (“CJEU”) published the judgment announced in our last blog in Case C-577/13, in response to some of the preliminary questions referred by the High Court of Justice (England and Wales), Chancery Division (Patents Court) in a case between Actavis Group EHF, Actavis UK…
