While the genus antibody claim was effectively killed by the U.S. Supreme Court in Amgen v. Sanofi, it lives on in Europe despite a few recent setbacks at the European Patent Office ("EPO") and the Unified Patent Court...more
On February 28, 2024, following the European Commission's four 2023 proposals, the European Parliament adopted a legislative resolution on the amended proposal to create a Unitary Supplementary Protection Certificate ("USPC")...more
The European Patent Office ("EPO") has committed to specific timelines for its new practice of accelerating opposition proceedings....more
The UPC, a single patent court for European Union Member States, has published the first statistics on its case load since its establishment in 2023. Between June 1, 2023, and January 31, 2024, a total of 196 cases were filed...more
The European Parliament has adopted an amended European Commission proposal to regulate plants engineered using techniques such as CRISPR/Cas and ban any patenting of plants, plant parts, material, genetic information, or...more
2/20/2024
/ Biotechnology ,
CRISPR ,
European Commission ,
European Parliament ,
European Patent Convention ,
GMO ,
Intellectual Property Protection ,
Life Sciences ,
New Regulations ,
Patent Applications ,
Patent Litigation ,
Patent-Eligible Subject Matter ,
Patents ,
Plant Based Products ,
Public Health ,
Regulatory Reform
The redistribution of competences to the Munich, Paris, and Milan central chambers takes shape and brings complexity for chemistry patents....more
In Short -
The Background: Patent marking refers to the practice of indicating on a product that its underlying technology is protected through a patent. As an alternative to traditional patent marking, e-marking displays...more
12/1/2023
/ Damages ,
EU ,
Intellectual Property Litigation ,
Intellectual Property Protection ,
Inter Partes Review (IPR) Proceeding ,
Patent Infringement ,
Patent Litigation ,
Patent Marking ,
Patent Trial and Appeal Board ,
Patents ,
UK
The Background: There has been a growing trend to invalidate European patents by challenging their formal priority and using intervening prior art. The Technical Boards of Appeal of the European Patent Office ("EPO") referred...more
In Short -
The Situation: With the introduction of the Unified Patent Court ("UPC") system in Europe, the co-ownership of patents will have material effect on patents with unitary effect ("Unitary Patent")....more
In Short -
The Situation: While the national case laws of most Unified Patent Court ("UPC") Member States generally accept infringement actions by licensees, the scope and requirements of such actions differ greatly. The...more
Judges were recruited from across Europe and appointed in accordance with the decisions of the UPC Administrative Committee. The UPC will be led by German Federal Court of Justice Judge Klaus Grabinski as president of the...more
Multiple reports reliably suggest that the European Patent Office ("EPO") will end the "10-day rule" for calculating deadlines on November 1, 2023. Thereafter, deadlines will be simply calculated on the basis of the date...more
The ability to edit eukaryotic DNA entails an almost limitless ability to alter the genetic makeup of the plants that become our food. Recently, scientific attention has been directed to applying a class of new gene-editing...more
The creation of a new European Unified Patent Court (“UPC”) and a new patent with unitary effect (“Unitary Patent”), in which almost all member states of the European Union participate, is the most important change in the...more
The previously contemplated fee for opting out of "classical" European patents from the Unified Patent Court ("UPC") system has been abolished by the UPC Preparatory Committee. The UPC Case Management System will also allow...more
The EPO confirmed that a European patent application can be refused on the basis of double patenting under Articles 97(2) and 125 EPC, if a patent with the same effective date has already been granted for the same subject...more
The Enlarged Board of Appeal of the European Patent Office has decided that the exclusion from patentability of essentially biological processes for the production of plants or animals now also extends to plant or animal...more
Oral proceedings before examining divisions ("EDs") of the European Patent Office ("EPO") will now be held by videoconference pursuant to the April 1, 2020, decision by the EPO president. The decision applies to all oral...more
The BoA has been divergent regarding whether in an internal priority situation, the applicant would have a legitimate interest in a second patent protecting the same subject matter.
...more
On April 26, 2018, the United Kingdom ratified the Unified Patent Court Agreement ("UPCA"). This act removed any doubts concerning the United Kingdom's determination to participate in the agreement post-Brexit. However, the...more
The Situation: A recent decision by the Enlarged Board of Appeal of the European Patent Office confirmed that a 2011 ruling dealing with disclosed disclaimers does not overrule its 2004 decision applying to undisclosed...more
In December, we reported that the European Commission ("Commission") had issued an Interpretive Notice (2016/C 411/03) stating products produced by essentially biological processes should not be patentable. The notice came as...more
7/17/2017
/ Biologics ,
Biotechnology ,
EU ,
European Commission ,
European Patent Convention ,
European Patent Office ,
Genetically Engineered Animals ,
Patent Applications ,
Patent-Eligible Subject Matter ,
Patents ,
Plant Patents ,
Product Exclusivity ,
Subject Matter Conflicts ,
The Enlarged Board of Appeals
Beginning in 2009, the Boards of Appeal of the European Patent Office ("EPO") issued a series of decisions that essentially created a new priority law in Europe that allowed members of the same patent family to negate each...more
3/16/2017
/ EU ,
European Patent Convention ,
European Patent Office ,
Novelty ,
Paris Convention ,
Patent Portfolios ,
Patents ,
Priority Date Cutoff ,
Priority Patent Claims ,
Subject Matter Conflicts ,
The Enlarged Board of Appeals