As noted on the Bristows website the French Senate launched, on 23 October 2013, a Bill authorising ratification of the Unified Patent Court Agreement. The Bill can be found here and contains an overview of the UPC system. The Bill has been flagged up under an accelerated procedure which presumably means France is pushing to be the first of the “required 3” countries to ratify the Agreement (the other two required countries are the UK and Germany).

The UK’s IP Bill is, of course, in the House of Commons where it is currently awaiting a date for its second reading. UK ratification is not expected until early 2015. If anyone knows the state of play in Germany then feel free to drop us a line or post a comment below!

Mark Richardson 1 November 2013