The German Bundesgerichtshof (Federal Court of Justice, FCJ) has issued the decision “Bildstrom” (judgment of 26 February 2015, docket no. X ZR 37/13) dealing with the patentability of a system and a method for displaying an image stream. The attacked patent EP 1474927 concerns a technical teaching for displaying an image stream, wherein at least…
An EPO board held that observations filed by third parties during inter parte appeal must be disregarded by the board, unless they concern amendments during opposition or appeal, in which case the board had discretion whether or not to consider the observations in the examination of the amendments. Also when a party to the appeal…
In this judgment the Court of Appeals Düsseldorf held that the manifest preparation of a product for a specific use which is covered by a use claim can be seen in information on the packaging and in the patient information provided with the pharmaceutical product to the end user. It confirms earlier case law in…
A patent applicant is not obliged to prove the industrial applicability of an invention. It is the Patent Office which must prove the lack thereof. A full summary of this case has been published on Kluwer IP Law.
Arbitration courts established to resolve conflicts between patents and generic or reference medicaments do not have jurisdiction to decide on the validity of the patent, even when it is argued as a defence in an action for infringement. Transferring the authorization to introduce a generic medicament in the market to a third party is not,…
The seizure of evidence is part of every patent litigator’s (pre-trial) arsenal. To some extent this measure is harmonised by the Enforcement Directive (art. 6 Directive 2004/48/EC). However, it does not yet have the same fire power in every European state. To get a taste of the Dutch state of play, specifically what the threshold…
An accused party’s belief in the invalidity of a patent is not a defense to a claim that the party induced infringement of the patent, the U.S. Supreme Court has held. In a dispute between Commil USA and accused infringer Cisco Systems, the Court reversed a holding of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the…
On 28 May 2015, the English Court of Appeal issued a ruling in the on-going Lyrica saga which, although almost certainly not representing the last word on the topic, took a markedly different approach to the correct construction of Swiss form claims to the first instance judge, Arnold J. One thing there does appears to…
By Mark Schweizer, Reinhard Oertli and Simon Holzer The Swiss lawmaker plans to introduce a new exemption from patent protection for physicians and pharmacies. The new exemptions aims to protect physicians and pharmacies from being involved in patent disputes concerning second medical use claims according to the EPC 2000 (purpose-limited product Claims). From Swiss-type claims…
The legendary deficient regulation of supplementary protection certificates (“SPCs”) has caused the Spanish Patent and Trademark Office (the “SPTO”) and Spanish Courts to struggle as to whether or not the “restitutio in integrum” procedure available to patents is also applicable to SPCs. The High Court of Justice of Madrid, in a recent Judgment of 22…
