There has been much excitement and comment amongst the UK patent profession following the Supreme Court’s decision in Actavis v Eli Lilly [2017] UKSC 48 (see previous comment here) on patent claim construction. However, the Court in that case did not clarify how “normal” principles of claim interpretation are now to be applied, and whether…
Co-author: Zsolt Lengyel, Danubia Patent and Law Office Just before Christmas, on 20 December 2017, the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) announced its judgment in C-492/16, Incyte, in a preliminary ruling proceeding initiated by the Budapest High Court. The decision can be considered a sequel to the CJEU’s earlier judgment C-471/15, Seattle…
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…
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit has affirmed the Patent Trial and Appeal Board’s rejection on inter partes review of 16 claims of a patent for a handheld universal tool for use with various remote tire pressure monitoring systems. The Board erred, however, in denying the patent owner’s request to substitute 16…
The constitutional complaint which was filed last year against German ratification of the Unified Patent Court Agreement, has been shrouded in secrecy. The complaint has not been published, nor the observations about the case, which the German Federal Constitutional Court (FCC) requested from goverment and a series of other organizations. Professor Winfried Tilmann gave his…
Readers will recall that, in its judgment of 6 October 2015 (Case C-471/14, Seattle Genetics), the CJEU concluded that the relevant date for calculating the term of a supplementary protection certificate (“SPC”) is not the date on which a marketing authorisation (“MA”) is granted, but the date when the addressee is notified of the decision…
Artists, writers, singers would undoubtedly be thrilled to see a list of most popular works being dominated for years by their books or songs or other creations. In the case of this blog, however, the top ten of most popular items is a sad display of the longstanding social unrest and problems at the European…
I hope that all the readers of the Kluwer Patent Blog enjoyed a good start into a joyful, healthy and successful 2018. At the beginning of the new year it seems to be the right point in time to look back at the past year and recall the most remarkable developments and cases in Swiss…
IP organisations in the UK have requested the UK government for action in five key areas in light of the upcoming Brexit. In a note published late December, they make recommendations on ‘the biggest areas where Government action is necessary to ensure continuity and certainty of IP law and to prevent disruption both to undertakings…
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…
