The extent or scope of the protection conferred by a European patent or a European patent application shall – cf. Article 69 European Patent Convention – be determined by the claims. Nevertheless, the description and drawings shall be used to interpret the claims.
The extent of protection conferred by a patent in Poland has its legal basis in the Polish Act on Industrial Property Law of 30 June 2000. According to Article 63 section 2 of the Industrial Property Law, the extent of protection conferred by a patent shall be determined by the scope of the patent claims….
As already explained in a previous post, the company governed by the laws of Switzerland, Novartis AG, is the holder of patent EP 0 443 983 entitled “Acyl compounds”, whose subject-matter is a group of antihypertensive compounds, including valsartan, pharmaceutical preparations containing them and processes for the preparation of these compounds. This patent, filed on 12 February 1991, was to…
The case determined whether Abena A/S (hereinafter “Abena”) waste bags with lace up sealing, which had a seam with curved corners in one side of the bag, infringed Etradan BS ApS´ (hereinafter “Etradan”)patent nr. DK 176709. The Court found that Etradan did not successfully prove that the extra seam on Abena´s bag was aimed at…
In case of actual or potential discrepancies between claim language and the patent description which might allow a broader interpretation the Supreme Court confirms that the claim may not be interpreted to cover all options of the broader description if certain elements of the description have not been reflected in the claim language. Furthermore, such…
Since 2009, French law has allowed patentees to voluntarily limit their granted patent claims. This possibility, which has existed for a long time in a number of European countries, (e.g. Austria, Switzerland, Germany, Denmark, Italy, Norway and the United Kingdom) has recently been introduced into the European patent system through Art. 105bis et seq. of the…
Imagine: Wouldn’t it be fantastic to have one single patent which you could apply for at the WPO, the World Patent Office? A World Patent, which would be valid worldwide and which could be enforced in each single country of the world with worldwide effect? Decisions of the national local chambers of the World Patent…
The Court of Appeal overturned a decision of the High Court and held that the act of replacing Shutz’s bottles in Shutz’s outer protective cages with Werit’s bottles constituted ’ making’ products protected by Shutz’s patent, which encompassed both the bottle and the cage. Click here for the full text of this case. A full summary…
By final judgment of November 18, 2010 (Xa ZR 149/07, published in Mitt. 2011, 66 (in German only)), the German Federal Court of Justice (FCJ) decided on two interesting issues in nullity appeal proceedings regarding the German patent DE 101 41 650 pertaining to a patch containing the opioid fentanyl, a strong analgesic drug. Firstly,…
The Court of Appeal allowed Virgin’s appeal and overturned the decision of the High Court which had granted Delta’s application for summary judgment on the basis that it was wrong to say Virgin had no real prospect of establishing infringement of its patent. Click here for the full text of this case. A full summary of…
The Supreme Court held that the US doctrine of file wrapper estoppel is not applicable under the EPC. According to the Court only Article 69 of the EPC and the Protocol on its interpretation should be applied when determining the scope of a claim. The modifications of the patent application during prosecution cannot be taken…
