Until recently, third parties had not to worry about the date at which they would initiate a patent revocation action in France. However, nowadays, this issue is a hot topic in France. The origin of the current controversy is not recent as it lies in statute № 2008-561 of 17 June 2008 which shortened to 5 years…
Patent litigators around Europe will be taking note of the latest significant development from the English Patents Court in the case of Actavis v Eli Lilly [2014] EWHC 1511 (Pat) (judgment dated 15 May 2014), in which the English Court decided to grant declarations of non-infringement (DNIs) for three foreign designations of a European Patent…
Just recently, the judgement of the German Federal Court of Justice (Bun-desgerichtshof, BGH) in re X ZR 31/11 concerning a tyre removal machine has been published. This judgement is of relevance as the Federal Court of Justice had to answer a question of claim construction relevant in infringement and nullity proceedings likewise. The relevant question…
The recent decision T 1843/09 clarifies that the exception to the prohibition of reformatio in peius set out in G 1/99 in order to overcome an objection under Article 123(2) EPC is not the only exception. According to the Technical Board of Appeal, exceptions to this principle are a matter of equity in order to protect a non-appealing Proprietor against procedural discrimination in circumstances where the prohibition of reformatio in peius would impair the legitimate defence of its patent.
Those who embraced a deceptive feeling of easiness when they saw Articles 6 – 8 vanish from the text of Regulation (EU) Nº 1257/2012 of the European Parliament and the Council of 17 December 2012 will feel uneasy upon revisiting the judgment of 18 July 2013 (Case C-414/11 “Daiichi”) from the Court of Justice of…
by Bernward Zollner Since the beginning of 2014 a second senate for patent infringement cases (under presiding judge Dr. Ulrike Voss) has commenced to work. The already existing senate (under presiding judge Dr. Thomas Kühnen) could share the pending cases with the new sister-senate. This resulted in a schedule for the time between the submission…
Suppose you have an invention that resides in using a known substance in a known dosage for a known purpose, and your only distinguishing feature is that you apply a particular therapeutic measure after the administration of your substance. Can such a post-administration therapeutic measure, which is in essence a method of treatment, establish patentability…
The Court of Appeal held that the esomeprazole salt in Krka’s product with an optical purity of 98.8 – 99.5 % e.e. (enantiomeric excess) was an “optically pure compound” as claimed in AstraZeneca’s patent NO 307 378. The Court of Appeal upheld the judgment of the Oslo District Court granting AstraZeneca an injunction preventing Krka…
Last week, in In Re Roslin Institute, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit held that cloned cattle, sheep, pigs and goats are non-patent eligible subject matter under 35 USC § 101. While the result that these cloned animals cannot be patented may not be surprising, the basis for the court’s finding–that the claimed subject matter…
The European Commission has adopted new competition rules for the assessment of technology-transfer agreements. The revised Block Exemption Regulation for Technology-Transfer Agreements (EU) 316/2014 (“TTBER”), and the accompanying Guidelines (OJ, 2014/C 89/03) entered into force on May 1, 2014. The general structure and most of the provisions have in substance remained unchanged compared to the…
