Original news and analysis on international IP policy
By Monika Ermert for Intellectual Property Watch After four years of evermore controversial debate the German Parliament late Thursday passed another reform of the German Copyright Law intended to make updates for the digital age. But some are already planning…
By Tove Iren S. Gerhardsen Officials from the governments of China and India discussed challenges in developing national strategies for intellectual property and innovation at a recent colloquium, but common to both countries were aims to boost local innovation by…
By Monika Ermert for Intellectual Property Watch
MUNICH - After years of debate, the window of opportunity could be closing for the proposed next step for harmonising the European patent system by creating a centralised European patent court, judging by comments from officials.
German Justice Minister Brigitte Zypries, at a two-day symposium on the Future of the European Patent Jurisdiction in Munich this week, said that if European governments were unable to agree on an overall concept, "we should have the courage to put an end to the discussion and stay with the status quo."
By Dugie Standeford for Intellectual Property Watch Webcasters across the United States fell silent on 26 June in an effort to influence the passage of legislation reversing royalty rate increases many say will kill radio delivered over the Internet. The…
By Tatum Anderson for Intellectual Property Watch
A debate over how long to give exclusive rights over data submitted by pharmaceutical companies to governments in order to receive approval to sell a drug in their markets is controversial not only in India, but worldwide.
By Tatum Anderson for Intellectual Property Watch
When the Indian government published its report recently on yet another pharmaceutical patent-related issue predicted to split the industry, the Indian newspapers were divided as to whether brand name producers, generics producers or public health advocates had won.
The reason for the confusion is that the report is an exercise in appeasement, said Shamnad Basheer, a law professor at George Washington University Law School, and expert on this latest controversial subject, called data exclusivity, which is the rights drugs producers have over the data used to obtain marketing approval in a country.
By Tatum Anderson for Intellectual Property Watch The latest chapter in the Swiss pharmaceutical company Novartis’ challenge to the Indian intellectual property system begins on 18 June when the Indian Patent and Trademark Appellate Board (IPAB) is scheduled to hold…
By David Cronin for Intellectual Property Watch BRUSSELS – The European Union should stop demanding that poor countries apply its intellectual property rules to medicines through trade negotiations with the African, Caribbean and Pacific (ACP) bloc, legal experts argued at…
By Dugie Standeford for Intellectual Property Watch A ruling by the Helsinki, Finland, District Court could have far-reaching implications for the use of technical protection measures (TPMs) in Europe, according to legal experts. The 25 May decision held that the…
By Dugie Standeford for Intellectual Property Watch
While the direct impact of the recent landmark US Supreme Court decision in Teleflex v. KSR on patent law and practice will be felt only in the United States, the case could indirectly spark changes to European patent processes, experts said. Its focus on the troublesome question of when an invention is "obvious," however, means it probably will not help global efforts to harmonise national patent systems, they said.
By Steve Seidenberg for Intellectual Property Watch
As more and more commerce crosses national borders, so do more and more items seen as infringing on patents. And patent holders are making a case for stronger international rules on enforcement to protect themselves.
International intellectual property treaties enable an inventor to file one patent application and obtain patent rights in multiple countries, but the treaties do not provide similar mechanisms for multinational enforcement. A patentee can sue in each country where infringement occurs, but this is often prohibitively expensive, they say.
By Dugie Standeford for Intellectual Property Watch The United States government and the US creative industries last week signalled a new crackdown on intellectual property (IP) infringement at home and abroad. In a flurry of activity, the Bush administration proposed…