The European Patent Office (EPO) is an organ of the European Patent Organisation, an intergovernmental organisation that was set up on 7 October 1977 on the basis of the European Patent Convention (EPC) signed in Munich in 1973. The EPO is responsible for the uniform procedure to grant European patents. Once the EPO has granted a European patent, the patent holder can validate it in every single contracting state. In the future, the EPO will also be in charge of deciding on requests for unitary effect of European patents under the Unitary Patent system.
Abstract This will be a very long post (sorry, dear readers!), yet it cannot and will not be comprehensive enough to cover all aspects of this topic. In summary, my take on EPO quality is that not all is bad and a lot of people are still doing a good job. However, it is presently…
What can people, in particular citizens of Munich and Bavaria, do if they feel that elementary constitutional rights are infringed, not somewhere abroad and far away, but literally next door, at the Isar river banks or in the Pschorrhöfe building? Unfortunately, this is no rhetorical question. If such things happen in the jurisdiction of German…
Part II (- sorry, this will be a bit longer, but a lot has accumulated recently…) How does the EPO in 2018 fare with regard to the criterion “expert, well supported and motivated staff”? To what extent is it already reality, and to what “vision” in the sense of fancy? In my personal view, it…
Part I – Introduction The word “vision” has a couple of fascinatingly different meanings. There is a famous saying by Helmut Schmidt, Germany’s chancellor from 1974-1982, who recommended to anyone proclaiming that he/she had a vision to see a doctor. According to wiktionary, vision may mean: 1. The sense or ability of sight. 2. Something…
Recently, “New Investment Guidelines of the European Patent Office” (CA/F 18/17 Rev. 1) was published among the “Administrative Council documents” on the EPO web site. The Investment Guidelines relate to management of the treasury of the EPO and outline a more flexible approach for investing the funds in the treasury. In particular, rather than being…
The Administrative Tribunal of the ILO (ILOAT), which decided a series of cases concerning the EPO in its 125th session last week, dismissed a complaint of the former SUEPO trade union chairman Elizabeth Hardon against her downgrading by EPO president Benoit Battistelli. After the suicide of an EPO employee in May 2012, Hardon, at the…
An EPO board of appeal observed that a careful opponent that is economically active in the same field as the patentee should search for internal evidence of public prior use before filing an opposition. If such internal evidence is filed belatedly, the fact the search was started only after filing the opposition per se is…
In 2017 Russia has been in the news quite a lot, even though mostly not for good, due to its despicable efforts to influence the elections in the US and the Brexit referendum via social media. We will yet have to see and hopefully learn more about who supported these efforts in the US and…
The European Patent Office has been established by an international agreement, the European Patent Convention. All functioning patent systems that I am aware of are based on a structural principle that is basically simple: There is a patent office that receives and examines patent applications and grants patents for those that satisfy the requirements of…
Yesterday was St. Nicholas Day in Germany and many other European Countries. As Wikipedia helpfully as always explains, St. Nicholas fills the boot with gifts and sweets overnight, and at the same time checks up on the children to see if they were good, polite and helpful the last year. If they were not, they…
