The Unified Patent Court (UPC) is a planned future court common to EU Member States which participate in the Unitary Patent system, and it will be part of their judicial system. After a transitional period of 7 years or 14 years at most, it will have exclusive competence in respect of traditional European patents and European patents with unitary effect (Unitary Patents). The UPC is based on the Unified Patent Court Agreement. The Unitary Patent system and the UPC are planned to start functioning once certain ratification conditions have been fulfilled.
The possibility to bifurcate proceedings is a concern to many potential users of the future Unified Patent Court (UPC). Proceedings in Germany, in which infringement decisions may be rendered long before a judgment is given on the validity of a patent, serve as an alarming example. Moreover, bifurcation is said to be attractive to patent…
The new long arm jurisdiction provision in the Brussels I Regulation (recast) is one of the most remarkable elements of the Unitary Patent (UP) package, according to French lawyer and IP specialist Pierre Véron. Pierre Véron and Thomas Cottier of Bern University are the authors of the renowned Concise International and European IP Law, a…
We are delighted to announce that on 12 February 2015 Kluwer Law International is hosting a free webinar by Pierre Véron on the Unified Patent Court. Wolters Kluwer present this webinar by Pierre Véron, Attorney-at-law, Véron & Associés, Paris, Honorary President of the European Patent Lawyers Association (EPLAW), Member of the Drafting Committee of the…
The expected number of local divisions of the future Unified Patent Court (UPC) is so high that one may wonder if there will be any advantage in terms of specialization of judges and economies of scale. Bas Pinckaers, head of the patent department of Van Doorne and co-organizer of the Unitary Patent Package Conference on…
By Rechtsanwalt Dr. Ingve Björn Stjerna, LL.M., Certified Specialist for Intellectual Property Law, Düsseldorf. This article reflects the personal opinion of the author. On 18 November 2014 Advocate General Yves Bot delivered his Statements of Position (afterwards “Opinions”) in terms of Spain’s nullity actions against the two Regulations on the “unitary patent”, his recommendation to the CJEU…
The Dutch company Philips is among the top-10 Patent Cooperation Treaty (PCT) applicants and the top-3 European Patent Convention (EPC) applicants. Owning about 64,000 patents and filing approximately 1,500 patent applications each year (with a strong focus on the growth areas of health and well-being), much is at stake for the company with the introduction…
Last week, we reported on the challenging endeavour to set up Patent Translate, the machine translation system which is under joint development by the European Patent Organisation (EPO) and Google and which is a crucial element of the Unitary Patent (UP) package. Intellectual Property Office (IPO) officials from Hungary, Finland and the Czech Republic told…
The German ratification of the Unified Patent Court Agreement will most likely be decisive for the moment when the Unified Patent Court comes into existence. In an interview on recent developments regarding the UPC, Bird & Bird partner Wouter Pors told Kluwer IP Law that the Preparatory Committee and Member States are in contact to…
For Europeans who don’t speak English, German or French, the three official Unitary Patent (UP) languages, the future UP system will bring about an even more radical change than for those that do. Over the years, millions of patents from companies all over the world will have been held valid in their territory, although these…
As the readers will know, on 18 November 2014, Advocate General Yves Bot published his conclusions in cases C-146/13 and C-147/13, whereby he has proposed that the Court of Justice of the European Union (“CJEU”) reject the nullity actions filed by the Kingdom of Spain against Regulation (EU) 1257/2012 (Enhanced cooperation) and 1260/2012 (Translation arrangements)…
