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24 Feb 2017


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Unified Patent Court and Unitary Patent

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The Supreme Court's Judgment in Eli Lilly v Actavis UK Ltd and Others: how to understand it and why it is important

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Jane Lambert

Supreme Court (Lords Neuberger, Mance, Clarke, Sumption and Hodge)  Eli Lilly v Actavis UK Ltd and others[2017] UKSC 48 (12 July 2017)

What the Appeal was about
The pharmaceutical company Eli Lilly and Co ("Lilly") has developed a drug called pemetrexed which it markets under the brand name Alimta for the treatment of various types of cancer. Used on its own, pemetrexed has unpleasant side effects that can sometimes be fatal but these can be avoided when it is administered as a compound called pemetrexed disodium in combination with vitamin B12.

The use of pemetrexed disodium in the manufacture of a medicament for use in combination with vitamin B12 (and, optionally, folic acid) for the treatment of cancer is monopolized in the United Kingdom, France, Italy, Spain and a number of other European countries by European patent number No 1 313 508. There are also corresponding patents for the same invention in many other countries around the world.

This medicine is no…
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When it comes to the Crunch: CRUNCH MORTGAGES and bad faith

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Jane Lambert

An exception to the rule that a trade mark registration cannot be challenged for non-use in the first 5 years after registration is where the application to register the trade mark was made in "bad faith". The legislative mechanism is provided by s.47 (1) of the Trade Marks Act 1994:

"The registration of a trade mark may be declared invalid on the ground that the trade mark was registered in breach of section 3 or any of the provisions referred to in that section (absolute grounds for refusal of registration)."

Subsection (6) of s.3 provides:

"A trade mark shall not be registered if or to the extent that the application is made in bad faith."

But what does "bad faith" mean exactly? In Hotel Cipriani SRL and Others v Cipriani (Grosvenor Street) Ltd and others[2009] Bus LR D81, [2008] EWHC 3032 (Ch), [2009] RPC 9, Mr Justice Arnold reviewed the Engish and European cases and concluded that it connoted not only dishonesty but also "…
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Cakes and Copyright

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Jane Lambert

According to the BBC, the US food blogger Elizabeth  LaBau has brought proceedings against the publishers of The Food Network for copyright infringement (see "US food blogger sues Food Network over snow globe cakes"  3 June 2017). Copyright infringement falls within the jurisdiction of the federal courts in the USA so I looked up recent filings in the US District Court and found that proceedings had been filed on 1 June 2017 by William Bowen on behalf of Ms LaBau against Television Food Network GP in the US District Court for the Central District of California.

 Ms LaBau blogs about cakes and desserts in her SugarHero! blog. One of her confections is "Snow Globe Cupcakes with Gelatin Bubbles". The BBC reports that Ms LaBau does not complain that copying her recipe infringed her copyright as "it is almost impossible to claim copyright over a list of ingredients" but she does object to the copying of a video explaining how to make the cupcakes,…
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