Patents: TNS Group Holdings Ltd. v Nielsen Media Research Inc
A fascinating little case on judicial discretion. The claimant in T NS Group Holdings Ltd. v Nielsen Media Research Inc . claimed the revocation of the defendant's patent for a television audience management measurement system. It had also launched opposition proceedings in the European Patent Office under art 99 of the European Patent Convention. Shortly before the issue of the claim form in the present proceedings the patentee had offered the claimant a licence the terms of which were not disclosed but which are unlikely to have been burdensome. The patentee applied to strike out the claim under CPR 3.4 , alternatively asking for a stay on the following grounds: (1) the revocation proceedings were pointless and wasteful and served no commercial purpose in view of the offer of a licence; (2) the proceedings had been brought for an improper purpose; and (3) the English revocation proceedings duplicated wastefully the opposition proceedings at the EPO . Mr Justice A...