NIPC Law

In my post on Lord Marland ( "Lord Marland becomes Minister for Intellectual Property"  15 Sept 2012I) I referred to The UK’s International Strategy for Intellectual Property , As there was considerably more interest in that policy document than there was in the Minister in my feedback I have decided to take a closer look at that document. In  Digital Opportunity A Review of Intellectual Property and Growth   Professor Ian Hargreaves recommended that "The UK should resolutely pursue its international interests in IP, particularly with respect to emerging economies such as China and India, based upon positions grounded in economic evidence. It should attach the highest immediate priority to achieving a unified EU patent court and EU patent system, which promises significant economic benefits to UK business. The UK should work to make the Patent Cooperation Treaty a more effective vehicle for international processing of patent applications." He amplified his thinkin...

My first inkling that the Lisbon Treaty was not something that IP practitioners could ignore was when I saw the following paragraph in the EPO's press release on the "EU patent" of 18 Dec 2009: "With the entry into force of the Lisbon Treaty, the European Union replaced and succeeded the European Community and has been endowed with legal personality. Therefore, the Community patent is now called the "EU patent" and the European and Community Patent's Court (ECPC)" has been renamed the "European and European Union Patent's Court (EEUPC)". The reason for my double take was that the EU has been in existence ever since the Treaty of Maastricht in 1993 but we never hear talk of an "EU trade mark" or a "registered European Union design" so I had a look at the Competitiveness Council's proposal. Sure enough, I found the following words "In view of the entry into force on 1 December 2009 of the Lisbon Treaty, the...