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Unitary Patent Package – UPC Agreement – 24 signatures received
After a reasonable delay the signing ceremony for the agreement on the unified patent court took place today (19 February 2013).
As alluded to in the press release a total of 24 member states signed the agreement, including Italy.
19th February 2013 is UPC signing day!
As announced here the signing ceremony for the agreement on the unified patent court will take place on 19 February 2013 (on or around 2.15 Central European time).
Control your excitement readers!
The press release for the signing ceremony also suggests that we will be able to live stream the entire event (at this location).
The IP Federation, the Minister and the European Scrutiny Committee
The IP Federation represents the views of UK Industry and, as can be seen from the front page of their website, has a pretty impressive list of members. As announced here the IP Federation has written to the UK Minister for IP (Viscount Younger of Leckie, Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Intellectual Property in the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills) with a request for an economic analysis to be performed on the effect on the UK economy of the unitary patent system before ratification of the unified patent court agreement takes place.
It will be interesting to see what, if any, response the IP Federation get from Lord Younger. On a related subject we note that the European scrutiny committee has recently cleared the Draft Agreement on a Unified Patent Court and draft Statute (see here for details).
Unitary Patent Package – Rules of Procedure for the Unified Patent Court (14th Draft)
As noted in our tweet last week the 14th draft of the Rules of Procedure of the Unified Patent Court have appeared online (a copy can be found here). The document runs to almost 150 pages and 382 rules so it’s something of an early Christmas present for insomniacs.
The release of the 14th draft is expected to shortly be followed by the public consultation exercise on the rules of procedure. IPcopy understands that the window for public comments could be as short as one month and we will let you know as soon as we hear more. It is noted that page 2 of the 14th draft states that it is the aim of the Drafting Committee to complete the draft rules within three months of the signature of the Agreement (which is expected to happen on 19th February).
Unitary Patent Package – Timeline of events for 2013/2014
The much heralded unitary patent package* appears to be moving towards implementation after many years of proposal and counter-proposal.
Looking ahead, the various parts of the package are likely to come into force in 2014 (according to the official timescale anyway). Over the coming 12-24 months, there are a number of keys dates to note.
Unitary patent package – alternative description using 1000 most common words only
In an earlier post we recast an Apple patent claim into “up-goer-five” style by rewording the claim using only the 1000 most common words available (according to this xkcd comic). We weren’t planning on revisiting this style of drafting but ipcopyemily worked up a description of the unitary patent package for the IPcopy team’s amusement and I thought it was too good not to share. So, without further ado, here’s the unitary patent package in “up-goer-five” format. You might think it makes more sense than the real version but I, of course, couldn’t possibly comment.
This is the last time we’ll do this…..promise…..probably…..
Unitary Patent Package – does Article 47(5) of the UPC Agreement hardcode bifurcation?
One of the most frequently-discussed concerns regarding the unified patent court agreement is the possibility of bifurcation*. This has, in turn, lead to concerns in some quarters that local divisions of the unified patent court could set themselves up to be patent proprietor friendly but send validity counterclaims back to the central division. In such scenarios, the argument goes, a patent owner could secure an injunction in the local division based on the issue of infringement that would have effect across the whole of the unitary patent area before validity has even been heard in the central division.
Regardless of the above “doomsday” scenario, however, it is noted that according to the UPC agreement the defendant will be able to raise validity as a counterclaim within an infringement action. It will then be up to the local division in question as to whether they hear both infringement and validity (I&V) or whether they kick the validity part of the action back to the central division (and thereby create a bifurcated case). [This IPcopywriter has assumed (probably naively) that local divisions will probably follow the practice of the country within which they are set up.]
However, on a review of the final text of the UPC agreement, we have come across a particular scenario, written explicitly into the agreement, in which the defendant is apparently not even able to raise validity as a counterclaim in an infringement action. We are referring to Article 47(5) UPC agreement and the scenario where an exclusive licensee brings an infringement action.
Unitary Patent Package – Final texts
The final text of the Agreement on a Unified Patent Court has now been published by the Council of the European Union. The two regulations relating to the unitary patent have already been published. Links to all three documents are below and also on our unitary patent package page.
1) Regulation (EU) No 1257/2012 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 17 December 2012 implementing enhanced cooperation in the area of the creation of unitary patent protection – here.
2) Council Regulation (EU) No 1260/2012 of 17 December 2012 implementing enhanced cooperation in the area of the creation of unitary patent protection with regard to the applicable translation arrangements – here.
3) Agreement on a Unified Patent Court – here. Corrections to Agreement here and here.
Mark Richardson 17 January 2013
Unitary Patent Package – the national patent alternative
As noted in Emily Weal’s earlier post on the subject (see here) patent applicants will still have the option of opting out of the unitary patent package if desired and applying for direct national patents.
A note of caution was sounded in the earlier post highlighting that not all of the 25 European countries that are part of the unitary patent package permit national phase entry from a PCT application.
In this post we take a closer look at which countries you need to keep an eye on.
Unitary Patent Package – Q&A
This is IPcopy’s original Q&A post on the unitary patent package (published 20 December 2012). A more recent and updated version of this post, which was published on 10 April 2013, can be found here.
After last week’s vote in the European parliament (Note: this article was published 20 December 2012), it seems that the unitary European patent really is here to stay. Many of the finer details are yet to be sorted out, and there is plenty of speculation in the patent world right now as to how things will pan out over the next few years. But there’s also plenty that we now know for sure about how the unitary patent will work, and how it might begin to affect your IP decisions, so here on IPCopy are the answers to your burning questions (grab a hot beverage of your choice and get comfy – it’s a long one…!):
IPcopy 