On 24 November 2016, the Court of Appeal of Barcelona (Section 15) handed down a judgment in which it confirmed that “the interpretation of the scope of protection of a patent for the purposes of analysing its validity cannot be different from when its infringement is analysed”. The Judges also highlighted the relevance of the…
Most readers will be aware of the so-called “all elements” test, whereby patent infringement is normally discarded unless the allegedly infringing device or process reproduces each and every element of the claim. The “all elements” test contrasts with the so-called “essentiality” test. According to this test, there can still be infringement if an element of…
In the past decade, a new character of the patent theatre has made inroads into the case law of some EU Member States, “imported” from the so-called “EPO case law”. Its name is “plausibility”. The origin of the plausibility concept can be traced to Decision T 939/92 (AgrEvo), where the EPO’s Board of Appeals held…
Last Saturday (1 April 2017) the Spanish Official Gazette (“Boletín Oficial del Estado”) published Royal Decree 316/2017, dated 31 March, containing the Implementing Regulations of the Patents Act 24/2015, of 24 July. As readers will remember from previous blogs, the new Patents Act, which, among other aspects, introduced the compulsory examination of substantive patentability requirements,…
Spain will not join the Unitary Patent system. That became clear today during a session of the Spanish parliament. Earlier this month, the parliamentary committee for economics, industry and competitiveness had approved a motion of the socialist party PSOE, requesting the government to reconsider joining the system. Only the Popular Party, which runs the minority…
Will the Unitary Patent project become operational on 1 December 2017? The UPC Preparatory Committee has warned this date ‘is conditional and provided with the clear disclaimer that there are a number of factors that will dictate whether it is achievable.’ But for supporters of the UP and UPC, developments are encouraging. Crucial ratification procedures…
The Spanish Parliament, the Congreso de los Diputados, surprisingly adopted a non-binding motion on 7 March 2017, requesting the government to join the Unitary Patent system. Spain has been the only EU member state to stay completely out of this new European patent system, that is expected to start functioning in December of this year…
The Spanish parliament will vote today on a non-binding motion of the socialist opposition party PSOE, which calls on the government to reconsider joining the Unitary Patent system. The motion was filed last month by MP Patricia Blanquer. According to Blanquer, Spain should no longer stay on the side-line now that the system is about…
One of the objectives of the new Patents Act that is to come into force on 1 April 2017 is to prompt a higher level of specialization of Judges dealing with patent cases. In particular, article 118 assigns jurisdiction to hear patent cases to a sub-group of Courts within the general group of “Commercial Courts”…
The new Spanish Patent Act, which will come into force on 1 April 2017, will introduce a modernised “utility model” that is expected to become the natural alternative for “non-examined” patents, which the new law has put at bay. One of the most controversial provisions dealing with utility models is Article 137, which reads as…
