Lord Hoffman (former Court of Appeal judge and presently at Queen Mary University) spoke about what can be done to harmonise the law. He said that the governments of most jurisdictions accept that judges have some choice in how the law is developed. There is then a range of views of how much regard should…
I am happy to announce the release of my book US Patent Law for European Patent Professionals. An understanding of US patent law within the context of the US legal system has become increasingly important for patent professionals in Europe in recent decades. Europe and the US are closely linked economic zones, and many inventions…
On 24 March, 2015, the Enlarged Board of Appeal of the EPO, the final judicial arbiter of the interpretation of the European Patent Convention, issued Decision G 3/14 addressing the question of when, and to what extent, clarity objections could be raised by a party challenging the validity of a patent through the EPO’s Opposition…
The judgement “Schleifprodukt” rendered by the German Federal Court of Justice on 25 November 2014 could be seen as a step towards harmonisation with the EPO because the court carried out the test for the admissibility of claim amendments by assessing whether the feature combination of the amended claim in its entirety represents a technical teaching which is identifiable from the original application as being suitable for achieving the effects of the invention.
The Board of Appeal rejected an attempt to apply the fiction of novelty of “medical” substances and compositions of article 54(5) EPC to a dialysis membrane. Contrary to T2003/08 the claimed dialysis membrane did not contain any further substance that might constitute an active ingredient. With reference to arguments in T2003/08, the board noted that…
The Board emphasized that there was a relation between who was to be considered to be the skilled person for judging inventive step on one hand and the choice of the closest prior art on the other hand. A general problem to modify a product from one field so that it could be used in…
Inventions regarding a method of improving the yield of triploid seedless watermelons by pollination with a specific type of diploid water melon are not to be regarded as an essentially biological process for the production of plants and are therefore not excluded from patentability under Article 53(b) EPC. These biotechnological inventions according to Rule 26(2),…
by Dr. Simon Klopschinski Under EPO case law there is the “inescapable trap” of Article 123 (2) and (3) EPC. The German Federal Court of Justice decided in the “Winkelmesseinrichtung” case that the “inescapable trap” does not apply to German national patents. In recent time different nullity boards of the German Federal Patent Court have…
Charles de Secondat, Baron de Montesquieu knew it all as early as 1748: “Experience teaches that every human being who has the power tends to abuse it. Therefore, it is necessary that the power sets limits to the power. There are three things in every state authority: the legislature, the executive and the judiciary. There…
Under the new PCT Direct initiative announced in the Official Journal, it will, from 1 November 2014, be possible to respond to objections raised by the EPO against the priority application on filing the international application. This significantly streamlines the process of applying for an international application, and essentially gives the applicant an extra opportunity in the International Phase to overcome objections already raised by the EPO against the priority application, by submitting arguments or modifications with the international application.
