Original news and analysis on international IP policy
A new paper by a Norwegian researcher finds that recent legislation efforts on plant variety protection in Africa go beyond the requirements of the International Union for the Protection of New Varieties of Plants (UPOV).
Several leading public health groups have sent a letter to United States Trade Representative and US Patent and Trademark Office director asking for more transparency on the US position on a request by least-developed countries to indefinitely extend their World Trade Organization intellectual property waiver on pharmaceutical products.
The Federal Circuit will soon hear Lexmark v. Impression Products, a case about ink cartridges. Impression, a foreign buyer, refills spent Lexmark cartridges and resells them in the United States. Impression claims that Lexmark, having sold the cartridges, has exhausted its patent rights, and cannot hold Impression liable for patent infringement. The Federal Circuit will address whether the US patent is exhausted with the sale of the patented product outside the US, write Burcu Kilic and Peter Maybarduk.
The Place des Nations, home to the United Nations in Geneva, is adorned with a temporary exhibition this week. The work of Italian artist Davide Dormino representing Julian Assange, Chelsea Manning, and Edward Snowden was inaugurated this morning.
In a communication today, the European Commission said it agrees to support a least developed country request at the World Trade Organization to prolong indefinitely a current exemption on the enforcement of IP on pharmaceutical products. Now the decision moves to the EU member states.
The negotiating process to achieve post-2015 development goals has clarified the agenda that governments ought to follow until 2030. Unfortunately, due to vague terms and the lack of unequivocal definitions, a number of relevant issues still lie in uncertainty, writes Pietro Dionisio
Civil society groups are calling on the Swiss government to refrain from putting pressure on developing countries wishing to manufacture generic medicines without the consent of the patent holder. The groups allege that the Swiss government tried to unduly influence Colombia to not take such a step, though it is permitted by international trade rules.
The Swiss government, for its part, says it participated in a public consultation in Colombia and merely underlined that negotiations between governments and original manufacturers are a better way to go than a compulsory licence.
A government-ordered review of Australia's intellectual property arrangements could either resolve many important and long-standing issues or prove to be yet another political exercise in futility, academics say.
Failure to reach agreement over expanded intellectual property (IP) protections for medicines has proven to be a stumbling block to completion of the 12-country Trans Pacific Partnership negotiations. As expected, the US is continuing to pressure negotiating partners to adopt broader and longer monopoly protections for medicines. But the risks for their health systems are very high – and will be much higher if they don’t stick together in rejecting the US demands.
STRASBOURG – As UN Special Rapporteur Farida Shaheed prepares to finalise a second consecutive report on the connection between the right to science and culture and patent policy, two well-known academics took the floor at the University of Strasbourg Centre for International Intellectual Property Studies (CEIPI) recently to share their views and hopes for this long-awaited paper.
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The Medicines Patent Pool in Geneva is celebrating five years of existence this month. MPP Executive Director Greg Perry sat down with Intellectual Property Watch Catherine Saez to describe progress made since its inception, the success of its licensing agreement model, and plans for the future, including a possible extension to other diseases such as tuberculosis and hepatitis C.