Industrial Self Adhesives Limited v. Teknek Limited, Sheila Hamilton, Stephen Mitchell, Harrison Goddard Foote and HGF Law, Patents County Court, London, UK, 8 March 2012, [2012] EWPCC 10
Industrial Self Adhesives (“ISA”) commenced proceedings for unjustified threats of patent infringement against the defendants in respect TH Group’s patent, EP (UK) 1 499 549. Since TH Group was not one of the named defendants, it joined the proceedings as an additional claimant to a counterclaim for infringement. ISA alleged the patent was invalid and TH Group applied to amend the patent to limit its scope and further distinguish it from the cited prior art. The application to amend was advertised by the UK Intellectual Property Office (UK-IPO), no further opponents came forward and the UK-IPO indicated that they had no comments to make in relation to the proposed amendments.
The parties subsequently settled the dispute but the issue of amendment remained outstanding. HHJ Birss QC held that despite the proceedings having settled it was appropriate to deal with the amendments in the Patents County Court rather than require TH Group to make a fresh application to the UK-IPO to amend the patent. HHJ Birss QC further held that the amendments sought by TH Group were allowable.
Read judgment in English here.
Headnote: Robert Fitt
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