Among many other tasks, the Danish Government when taking over the EU Presidency as of 1 January took over the continued challenges (and problems) in connection with securing a compromise that may lead to a Unified Patent Court. Despite the intentions of the Polish presidency to land a compromise during its tenure, the issue remains…
The general rule in UK litigation is that the successful party is entitled to its costs. One exception to this rule, peculiar to patent cases, is a so-called ‘Earth Closet’ order. If an alleged infringer introduces a new piece of prior art, after service of its original Grounds of Invalidity, an Earth Closet order enables…
On 8 December 2011, the presiding judge of the Tribunal de Grande Instance of Paris has rendered an order in the context of the worldwide battle between Samsung and Apple. Samsung alleged that Apple’s iPhones 4S contain chips infringing its European patents No. 1 188 269 and 1 097 516, declared essential to the UMTS standard within the framework of ETSI (European…
The Supreme Court held that disputes relating to confidential information contained in an expert’s report, filed in the framework of descriptive seizure proceedings, can be heard by the court having granted leave for these proceedings. Such disputes do not have to be adjourned until the proceedings on the merits. Click here for the full text of this…
By Miquel Montañá In year 2021, Italy will celebrate the 600th anniversary of the patent granted by the Republic of Florence to Filippo Brunelleschi for his ship “Il Badalone”, the first patent ever granted. Quite ironically, the fathers of the first patent, and of the first Patent Act, approved by the Republic of Venice in…
Over the last few years, Spanish Courts have struggled to resolve an avalanche of cases where the core of the discussion was the legal effects of TRIPS on the effects of the Reservation made by Spain when it joined the European Patent Convention in 1986. According to this Reservation, patents filed before 7 October 1992…
We revisit this case, not this time regarding the question of what constitutes the ‘making’ of an invention as resolved by the Court of Appeal in March 2011, but with regards to the question of costs in relation to Schütz as an exclusive licensee. The general position under English law is if an exclusive licence…
In a recent decision by the Danish Maritime and Commercial Court (reported in the Danish Legal Gazette as U2011.2745S), the court ruled on the issue of restitution subsequent to default in making timely payment of a renewal fee. A US company, acting thorugh local patent counsel, failed to pay its 5 year renewal fee on…
by Miriam Büttner In a recent decision of 15 September 2011 (ref. no. 4b O 99/11) the District Court of Düsseldorf (LG Düsseldorf) found that a non-final decision of the utility model cancel-lation division of the German Patent and Trademark Office (GPTO), with which the utility model was declared (partially) invalid, is not a sufficient…
On 8 November 2011, in the case of Fresenius v Carefusion, the English Court of Appeal declared that “the Earth Closet order should be consigned to the place that bears its name.” The “Earth Closet” or See v Scott Paine Order was an idiosyncratic but potentially very important principle of English patent law. The Order…
