1. Introduction In an important decision of February 8, 2022 the Brussels Dutch Court of Enterprises (hereafter the “Court of Enterprises”) declared null and void a patent on an “apparatus, system and method for filling containers with fluids” (hereafter the “patent in suit”). The decision is interesting for multiple reasons, but this article will only…
The industrial actions at the European Patent Office, which were organised by trade union SUEPO with the support of the Central Staff Committee (CSC), go into their fourth month next week. The main reason for discontent with the EPO management is a new salary adjustment procedure which, according to SUEPO, ’causes a disastrous immediate and…
The Unified Patent Court will be a precious tool to help harmonizing the legal system in the EU and fostering innovation. That is the expectation of Elisabetta Papa, head of patents of the Italian IP firm SIB. She thinks Milan may replace London as Central Division seat dedicated to human necessities, chemistry, metallurgy, although “keeping…
Artificial Intelligence Systems or Devices cannot be “inventors” under the Australian Patents Act, the Full Federal Court has confirmed. The inventor of a patent must be a natural person. Does there need to be legislative change to address the role of Artificial Intelligence in the Australian patents scheme? An expanded five judge appeal bench of…
The “patent linkage system” is in general a system wherein market approval of generic drugs is linked with the status of the originator drug’s patents, for the purpose of early resolution of patent disputes and ensuring the stable and consistent supply of generic drugs. Japan has not statutorily adopted the patent linkage system, but the…
The transposition of the 2016 directive on trade secrets into French law by the law of 31 July 2018 and its implementing decree could have led to the expectation of difficulties with the so-called “saisies-contrefaçons”. The main one to remember is undoubtedly the application of the new article R. 153-1 of French Commercial Code to…
Social tensions at the European Patent Office seem to have reached new lows in a meeting last week between an ‘extremely hostile’ EPO president Antonio Campinos and staff representatives. In a letter about the event which was sent to staff members last week, the Central Staff Committee (CSC) wrote the atmosphere at a General Consultative…
Having been teaching Public International Law since 1990 and being a tenured professor of this field of law, this author has some difficulty in understanding the state of collective nirvana that the UPC Preparatory Committee has instilled amidst the UPC community, by causing them to believe that the “Protocol to the Agreement on a UPC…
The hurdle for being a co-inventor in a medicine field in Japan might be a little higher than what is expected from precedents. The IP High Court affirmed, in its judgement of 17th March 2021 (2020 (ne) No. 10053), the first instance decision of 21st August 2020 (2017 (wa) No. 27378) which denied co-inventorship of…
Another constitutional complaint against the Unified Patent Court Agreement? Is Italy withdrawing from the UPC? If even April fools’ day doesn’t go by without a proportion of jokes on the Unitary Patent project, one can be certain that after years of stagnation the Unified Patent Court and the Unitary Patent are fully back on the…
