EU - Agreement on a Unified Patent Court signed
The Agreement on a Unified Patent Court was signed on February 19, 2013 at a signing ceremony in Brussels by 24 EU member states. Bulgaria is said to sign in the coming days once internal procedures have been completed. Poland and Spain did not sign the agreement.
The signature of the Agreement triggers the ratification process by national parliaments. The Agreement requires 13 ratifications for entering into force, including the ratification by France, Germany and the United Kingdom.
For the documents making up the “patent package”, see the post dated 23/01/2013 here.
Read the press release of the Council Press: 61 Nr: 6590/13 here.
Reported by Dr. Rudolf Teschemacher
The Agreement on a Unified Patent Court was signed on February 19, 2013 at a signing ceremony in Brussels by 24 EU member states. Bulgaria is said to sign in the coming days once internal procedures have been completed. Poland and Spain did not sign the agreement.
The signature of the Agreement triggers the ratification process by national parliaments. The Agreement requires 13 ratifications for entering into force, including the ratification by France, Germany and the United Kingdom.
For the documents making up the “patent package”, see the post dated 23/01/2013 here.
Read the press release of the Council Press: 61 Nr: 6590/13 here.
Reported by Dr. Rudolf Teschemacher
Italy´s position is indeed ambiguous. It fights enhanced cooperation before the ECJ but participates in the UPC-Agreement. However, this allows proprietors of classic European Patents to obtain infringement decisions enforceable also in Italy. Validation of European Patents in Italy will still require translation of claims and description and therefore generate more costs compared with other countries. However, in the framework of the whole patent package, the Italian situation may offer patent proprietors even advantages when it comes to calculating damages. Under Art. 4 Section 4 of Reg. 1260/12 regarding the translation of European Patents with unitary effect, the patent infringer, in particular SMEs, may try to limit damages arguing that he had no knowledge of the content of a patent as it was not translated in his language prior to the infringement proceedings. In particular in proceedings involving SME, this objection may be an important obstacle for a patentholderfriendly damage calculation. Due to the translation requirement patent proprietors will not have to fear this argument in proceedings regarding classic European Patents and involving Italian companies before Italy´s UPC-Division.
Posted by: Tankred Thiem | 26/02/2013 at 14:14
Italy also signed the Agreement.
The final version was amended by a "Corrigendum" as of January 29, 2013, that can be found here:
http://register.consilium.europa.eu/pdf/en/12/st16/st16351-co01.en12.pdf
Posted by: Konstantin Schallmoser | 20/02/2013 at 15:15