On 28 March 2018, the Australian Government introduced the Intellectual Property Laws Amendment (Productivity Commission Response Part 1 and Other Measures) Bill 2018 to the House of Representatives. This follows IP Australia’s public consultation in October 2017 of an exposure draft of amendments for Australia’s IP laws that included, among other matters, a mechanism to phase out the…
On 28 March 2018, the Australian Government introduced the Intellectual Property Laws Amendment (Productivity Commission Response Part 1 and Other Measures) Bill 2018 in the House of Representatives. This follows IP Australia’s public consultation in October 2017 of an exposure draft of amendments for Australia’s IP laws that included, among other matters, a mechanism to phase out the…
On 23 October 2017, IP Australia released the draft Intellectual Property Laws Amendment (Productivity Commission Response Part 1 and Other Measures) Bill 2017 for public comment. The purpose of the Bill is to implement the Government’s response to the Productivity Commission’s recommendations on Australia’s IP Arrangements (our coverage of the Government’s response can be found…
The Productivity Commission released its final report into Australia’s IP arrangements in December 2016 (covered in our post earlier this year, ‘IP Rights vs IP Wrongs’). Now, the Australian Government has weighed in on the Commission’s recommendations, supporting some and ‘noting’ others. With respect to patent law, the Government supports the following recommendations: Add an…
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…
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….
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 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…
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…
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….
