Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria, Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, European Union, Extent of Protection, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Iceland, Ireland, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania, Netherlands, Norway, Pharma, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Scope of protection, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, SPC, Sweden, United Kingdom, Validity

(Bristows)/ /2 Comments

Yesterday, 25 April 2018, AG Wathelet has handed down his opinion in the Teva v Gilead reference (Case C-121/17) suggesting that the question should be answered as follows: “The fact that a substance or combination of substances falls within the scope of protection of the basic patent is a necessary, but not sufficient, requirement for…

EPC, Inventive step, Pharma, Pharmaceutical patent, Prior art, Public prior use

(Hoffmann Eitle)/ /9 Comments

Suppose you are a (patent) attorney in a pharmaceutical company and want to advise your company how to best protect the results of a clinical trial designed to find out the best possible treatment regimen of a certain known and approved drug X. The researchers of your company have devised and been allowed to conduct…

Case Law, United States of America

(Wolters Kluwer Legal & Regulatory US)/

The federal district court in Chicago did not err in dismissing a patent infringement suit filed by Maxon, LLC against several smart television manufacturers on the ground that the asserted patents—describing an electronic means of increasing user control over subscription entertainment content for smart TVs—were invalid as directed to an abstract idea that lacked an…

Enforcement, Infringement, Injunction, Netherlands

(Brinkhof )/ /1 Comment

Other than ex parte (evidentiary) seizures, ex parte preliminary injunctions are considered a rare phenomenon in the field of patent law in the Netherlands. The burden for obtaining an ex parte injunction is high and the allegedly infringing party could have filed a protective letter. Very recently the Dutch patent court in The Hague has…

EPO, Inventive step, Prior art, Spain

(Clifford Chance)/ /7 Comments

In one of the saga of cases that involved Societé des Produits Nestlé and companies that are trying to market capsules compatible with Nescafé’s Dolce Gusto system, the defendant alleged, among other arguments, that some of the patents asserted were null due to a lack of inventive step. The case was handled by Commercial Court…

Antibodies, Infringement, Sufficiency of disclosure, United Kingdom

(Bristows)/

by Steven Willis and Olivia Henry On 28 March 2018, the Court of Appeal overturned Henry Carr J’s finding that two Regeneron patents (EP (UK) 1 360 287 and EP (UK) 2 264 163) were insufficient. The judgment is an important reminder of the importance of taking the nature of the invention into account when…

Biologics, China, Litigation, Pharmaceutical patent

(Baker & McKenzie), (Baker & McKenzie FenXun (FTZ)), and , (ZY Partners)/

On October 8, 2017, the Chinese Communist Party and the State Council jointly issued a special opinion on the reform of drug and medical device approval system (“Innovation Opinion”). The Innovation Opinion together with an earlier China Food and Drug Administration (“CFDA”) document (“Circular No. 55”) issued in May 2017 (collectively “Reform Opinion”), propose that…