News

UIn consecutive updates yesterday and today, the UPC has announced that the local divisions in France, Germany and Italy will accept English alongside their respective national languages as language of the proceedings under Article 49(2) UPCA.

Update on languages of proceedings |
Unified Patent Court (unified-patent-court.org)

UWith respect to ongoing performance issues of the CMS system, the UPC has released a communication on a Worst Case Scenario concerning the filing of Opt-Out requests. Indeed, under such extraordinary circumstances the UPC will allow the filing of Opt-Out requests in form of a “hard copy”. In a nutshell, the following points appear to be most remarkable in this context for every practitioner: The...

nIn a statement published on 18 May, the Italian government has confirmed that Milan will be the third branch of the UPC’s central division, replacing London after Brexit. According to Italian Press (link), the Milan branch is expected to open for business in a few months and will be allocated the following competencies: medical-veterinary science and hygiene (and chemistry closely...

An overview of the languages of proceedings that will be accepted at the local and regional divisions is now available on the website of the Unified Patent Court. The Brussels local division is the one that accepts the most languages: Dutch, French, German and English. Many other local divisions also accept English alongside their national language. The local divisions of France, Germany and...

The UPC has finally published a decision about what will happen with the cases that were originally allocated to the London branch of the central division. Actions related to patents in IPC section (A – human necessities) shall be assigned to the seat in Paris while actions related to patents in IPC section (C – chemistry and metallurgy) shall be assigned to the section in Munich. The...

The Code of Conduct for UPC judges is now available on the website of the Unified Patent Court. A few highlights: a legally qualified judge, as well as a technically qualified judge who is a full-time judge of the Court may not engage in any other occupation, whether gainful of not, unless an exception is granted by the Administrative Committee. (Art. 4 §2)the exercise of the office of a...

On 25 April 2023, the UPC has announced the Presiding Judges for the Central Divisions as well as the Regional and Local Divisions. A corresponding document for designation, as released by the UPC, can be found here. Hence, the Central Division in Paris (FR) will be headed by Ms. Florence Butin while Ms. Ulrike Voß will preside the Central Division in Munich (DE). Of course, there is no decision...

Register now! Dear EPLIT members This will be EPLIT’s tenth anniversary, having been founded shortly after the signing of the UPC Agreement. Remarkably, we have now entered the UPC sunrise period and can look forward to the opening of the Court on 1 June. We therefore hope to see many of you at our Annual Meeting in Paris on 26 May 2023 (with dinner and drinks on 25 May) to celebrate this special...

With the start date of June 1st now rapidly approaching, the UPC has launched a general call looking for appointable candidates for the posts of both legally and technically qualified judges to be placed on the reserve list. The purpose of this call is to prepare the Court for a scenario in which a rapid uptake of the caseload requires a corresponding increase of appointed UPC judges. Appointed...

Earlier this month (February 2023), the UPC Administrative Committee approved a Code of Conduct for representatives with respect to all activities related to proceedings before the UPC. The representatives appearing before the UPC may be subjected not only to the Code of Conduct but at the same time also to the respective national and supranational regulations (in particular epi and CCBE). The...

As the German Federal Ministry of Justice just announced by a corresponding press release, Germany has ratified the Agreement on a Unified Patent Court today (February 17, 2023). Consequently, and in accordance with latest news releases about another practier period for the CMS, the Sunrise Period for the UPC can, indeed, start as of March 1, 2023. Finally, the UPC will open its doors on June 1...

Start of new test phase for the UPC’s Case Management System As of today, for a period of two weeks, external users are able to test the UPC’s Case Management System with strong authentication. The UPC has published a new user guide with details on how to create and activate your CMS account with strong authentication. Importantly, you have to access the CMS through the hyperlinks provided in...

Further update on the CMS system announced As the UPC has announced today, further steps forward have been made concerning the Case Management System, just before the shortly upcoming 2nd Sunrise Practice Period. In a nutshell, an optimized API opt-out process has been implemented which will not only available at the start of the Sunrise Period itself beginning on March 1, 2023, but also for the...

New test phase for the UPC’s Case Management System with strong authentication. From 13 to 24 February 2023, external users will be able to try out the sunrise functionalities of the UPC’s CMS, such as for example registering an opt-out for a European patent. During this period, the much discussed and anxiously anticipated strong authentication will be activated. This means that users will first...

EPO takes next major step towards the Unitary Patent – new forms publicly released During the final pre-Christmas week, the European Patent Office (EPO) took the next major step in its preparation for the upcoming Unitary Patent. Despite the latest postponement concerning the Unified Patent Court (UPC) by two months until June 1, 2023, the EPO has recently announced (see OJ 2022, A99-A110) that...

The UPC Administrative Committee has decided to adjust the start date of the Sunrise Period. This will now begin 1 March 2023, with the UPC then opening its doors on 1 June 2023. This step has been taken to allow users more time to familiarise themselves with the authentication requirements for accessing the UPC Case Management System (CMS). The UPC announcement can be viewed here An updated list...

For a long time, it was discussed in legal circles whether oral proceedings should be held primarily in the physical presence of the party representatives, as in the pre-Corona period, or, as the Corona pandemic forced upon us, with virtual presence via video conference, as was customary during the pilot project set up by the EPO for this purpose. The pros and cons were obvious: in physical...

Yesterday, the Unified Patent Court has published the list of judges that have been appointed to take up duties as soon as the Court becomes operational, which is now expected to be on 1 April 2023. The list contains a total of 85 judges. There are 34 legally qualified judges, among whom 27 are appointed to the Court of First Instance (distributed over the central, local and regional divisions)...

Last week, on July 8th 2022, the Administrative Committee (AC) of the Unified Patent Court (UPC) had its 2nd meeting in Luxembourg. We are pleased to report that the AC decided in favour of EPLIT becoming an observer of the UPC’s AC. During the meeting, EPLIT, in the form of our president Leythem Wall, was already able to provide comments on the latest draft of the Rules of Procedure (RoP) of the...

The member states of the European Patent Organisation (29 June 2022) have voted for another five-year term in office for the President of the European Patent Office (EPO), António Campinos, commencing 1 July 2023. António Campinos was appointed as EPO President on 1 July 2018. Under his leadership the EPO launched its Strategic Plan 2023 in 2019, focusing on sustainability and delivering the...

The reluctance of German Patent Infringement Courts to issue interlocutory injunctions on the basis of patents “merely” examined by a Patent Office may belong to the past: The CJEU in case C-44/21 ruled on 28th April 2022 that Article 9(1) of the Enforcement Directive (Directive 2004/48/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council dated 29 April 2004) precludes national case-law under which...

Please find here the amicus curiae brief submitted 26 April 2022 by EPLIT in respect of EPO Enlarged Board of Appeal pending case G2/21 – “Plausibility”. The referring Board of Appeal’s decision can be found here

Austria has completed the ratification of the ‘provisional protocol’ for the Unified Patent Court Agreement. This has initiated the startup phase of the Unified Patent Court. If this startup phase proceeds as planned and clears a last safety catch, the Unified Patent Court may open its doors by early 2023. On 19 January 2022 the Protocol to the Agreement on a Unified Patent Court on provisional...

EPLIT has conducted a survey among members on the costs of patent litigation proceedings in a selection of European jurisdictions.

EPLIT submitted an amicus curiae brief in respect of EPO Enlarged Board of Appeal pending case G1/21.

EPO VICO Proceedings – EPLIT Interview with World Intellectual Property Review (WIPR) In light of the recent referral to the EPO Enlarged Board of Appeal on videoconference Oral Proceedings, EPLIT President Leythem Wall has been interviewed by World Intellectual Property Review (WIPR) on his and EPLIT’s views. Particular reference is made to the results of the survey that EPLIT conducted in...

Please find here EPLIT’s position paper on the EPO Board of Appeal User Consultation regarding Oral Proceedings by videoconference, submitted on 27 November 2020.

EPLIT has also carried out a survey with its members on the use of videoconferencing in examination, opposition and appeal proceedings at the EPO. The results of this survey can be found here.