Copyright - Edozo Ltd v Valos (UK) Ltd,

The Rolls Building,
Location of the Intellectual Property Enterprise Court

Author Muhammad Karns, Judicial Office X feed Licence CC BY-SA 4.0

Source Wikimedia Commons

 

Jane Lambert

Intellectual Property Enterprise Court (HH Judge Hacon) Edozo Ltd v Valos (UK) Ltd [2026] EWHC 93 (IPEC) (21 Jan 2026)

This was an application by the claimant to strike out parts of the defendant's defence and counterclaim. The claimant had brought proceedings for a declaration of non-infringement of copyright, while the defendant counterclaimed for relief from infringement.   The claimant's application came before His Honour Judge Hacon on 15 Jan 2026.  By para [61] of his judgment in Edozo Ltd v Valos (UK) Ltd [2026] EWHC 93 (IPEC) (21 Jan 2026), His Honour acceded to the application.

The Parties

The claimant was Edozo Ltd ("Edozo") and the defendant was Valos (UK) Ltd. ("Valos").  The judge described Edozo and Valos as "competitors in a market which provides valuations and other information about real property" in para [3] of his judgment.  He added in the same paragraph that "[b]oth offer their customers access to software based systems which supply the information." 

He observed in para [4] that "Valos's system is known as the 'Valos Platform'. Customers of the Valos Platform are given access to alternative graphical user interfaces, or GUIs, on the Valos website. The alternative GUIs allow customers to obtain different types of information. In each case, the Valos Platform produces what are called 'Valos Reports' in Microsoft Word. The GUIs are called 'Valos Report Graphics'." Valos Reports are built from templates referred to as the 'Valos Template Reports'.  Further information selected by a user may be added to a "Valos Template Report" to produce a Final Report.

The judge said at para [6] that for some time before the dispute arose, Edozo had offered a service providing customers with information in various forms, such as transaction data for commercial properties in the UK, the identity of current occupiers of commercial properties and boundary maps for such properties. In late 2023, Edozo added to its portfolio what it called 'Edozo Reports'.  Like Valos's reports, these provided valuations and associated information about properties in the UK. 

Edozo Reports are generated by a system referred to as the 'Edozo Platform'. The system is accessed by customers through GUIs provided on Edozo's website. Edozo's GUIs are referred to in the statements of case as 'Edozo Report Graphics'. The overall product that is marketed to customers, called the 'Edozo Reports Product', facilitates accurate and speedy production of Edozo Reports.

The Dispute

Valos believed that the Edozo Reports were suspiciously similar to its Valos Reports. It wrote to Edozo, complaining that Edozo was infringing Valos's copyrights.  Initially, Valos relied on copyright in the Valos Template Reports and the Valos Report Graphics. Later, it alleged that Edozo was infringing copyright in the underlying software of the Valos Platform.

The parties referred their dispute to mediation in April 2025, but failed to settle. 

On 17 April 2025, Valos's solicitors sent a letter to Edozo warning that Valos was preparing to issue a claim of copyright infringement. On 29 April 2025, Edozo took the initiative by suing Valos for declarations of non-infringement. Valos responded by counterclaiming for infringement.

Defence and Counterclaim

Valos stated that users of its software proceed through a set of steps which the judge called the 'Valos Steps, ' while users of Edozo's software proceed through equivalent steps known as the 'Edozo Steps.'  Valos alleged that the Edozo Steps reproduced a substantial part of the Valos Steps.

The Application

Edozo contended that Valos's case was bad in law and applied for it to be struck out under CPR3.4 (2) (a) for failing to disclose a cause of action.   The parties agreed that the similarities between the Edozo Steps and the Valos Steps were such that Edozo must have copied the Valos Steps.

Idea-Expression Dichotomy

Edozo argued that the copyright in a computer program protects the skill, judgment and labour in devising the source code of a the program but not its functionality.  The point raises the issue of where to draw the line between the expression of ideas which is protected by copyright law and the ideas themselves which are not.

In Kogan v Martin and others [2019] EWCA Civ 1645, [2020] EMLR 4, [2020] ECDR 3, [2020] FSR 3, Lord Justice Floyd said at para [34]:

"… Copyright, of course, does not subsist in mere ideas, but in their expression. That proposition is a well-established one in English law, and is now also to be found in a number of international treaties and EU Directives: see art.9 (2) of the Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights ("TRIPs") and art.2 of the WIPO Copyright Treaty. The ideas/expression dichotomy has, however, been described as "notoriously slippery": see Simone, Copyright and Collective Authorship (Cambridge University Press, 2019), at p.41. A mere idea, stripped of any context, is of course not the subject of copyright. Jacob J put it in this way in IBCOS Computers Ltd v Barclays Mercantile Highland Finance Ltd [1994] F.S.R. 275 at p.291:

'The true position is that where an 'idea' is sufficiently general, then even if an original work embodies it, the mere taking of that idea will not infringe. But if the 'idea' is detailed, then there may be infringement. It is a question of degree. The same applies whether the work is functional or not, and whether visual or literary. In the latter field the taking of a plot (i.e. the 'idea') of a novel or play can certainly infringe – if that plot is a substantial part of the copyright work. As Judge Learned Hand said (speaking of the distinction between 'idea' and 'expression'): 'Nobody has been able to fix that boundary and nobody ever can'.'"

Judge Hacon said at para [29] that of his judgment in Edozo that the boundary was really an issue of substantiality. If what was taken was an idea too general to constitute a substantial part of the idea embodied in a copyright work, there was no infringement. If, on the other hand, the idea within the copyright work was reproduced in sufficient detail, then infringement would occur.

The learned judge considered the judgments of Mr Justice Pumfrey in Navitaire Inc v Easyjet Airline Co. and another [2005] ECC 30, [2005] Info TLR 1, [2006] RPC 3, [2004] EWHC 1725 (Ch), [2005] ECDR,  Lord Hoffmann in Designers' Guild Ltd v Russell Williams (Textiles) Ltd  [2000] WLR 2416, [2000] UKHL 58, [2001] ECDR 10, [2000] 1 WLR 2416, [2001] FSR 113, [2001] FSR 11, [2001] 1 All ER 700, Lord Justice Lewison in SAS Institute Inc v World Programming Ltd. [2013] EWCA Civ 1482, [2013] Info TLR 35, [2014] RPC 8, [2015] ECDR 17 and Lord Justice Jacob in Nova Productions Ltd v Mazooma Games Ltd   [2007] BusLR 1032, [2007] EWCA Civ 219, [2007] Bus LR 1032, [2007] ECDR 6.

Conclusion

His Honour concluded at para [58] that the Valos Steps were not a form of expression of the Valos source code. They were not protected by the copyright in that source code. Copying the Valos Steps by the creation of the Edozo Steps was not an act capable in law of being an act of infringement of the copyright in the Valos source code. He decided that those parts of the defence and counterclaim that alleged indirect infringement should be struck out.

Comment

At para [125] of Navitaire, Mr Justice Pumfrey said that the extent to which the look and feel of a computer program could be protected by copyright was a new problem and one that was peculiar to computers.   He explained:

"The reason it is a new problem is that two completely different computer programs can produce an identical result: not a result identical at some level of abstraction but identical at any level of abstraction. This is so even if the author of one has no access at all to the other but only to its results."

Drawing analogies from other literary works like the plot of a novel did not help:

"The analogy with a plot is for this reason a poor one. It is a poor one for other reasons as well. To say these programs possess a plot is precisely like saying that the book of instructions for a booking clerk acting manually has a plot: but a book of instructions has no theme, no events, and does not have a narrative flow. Nor does a computer program, particularly one whose behaviour depends upon the history of its inputs in any given transaction. It does not have a plot, merely a series of pre-defined operations intended to achieve the desired result in response to the requests of the customer.;"

Mr Justice Pumfrey suggested what he believed to be a more apposite analogy at [127] of Navitaire:

"… Take the example of a chef who invents a new pudding. After a lot of work he gets a satisfactory result, and, thereafter, his puddings are always made using his written recipe, undoubtedly a literary work. Along comes a competitor who likes the pudding and resolves to make it himself. Ultimately, after much culinary labour, he succeeds in emulating the earlier result, and he records his recipe. Is the later recipe an infringement of the earlier, as the end result, the plot and purpose of both (the pudding) is the same? I believe the answer is no.'"

These issues have been current for over two decades and, as Edozo shows, are nowhere near settled.  Anyone wishing to discuss this case can call me during the usual UK business hours or send me a message at any time.