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The Unified Patent Court opens its doors today. It is now possible to apply for a European patent that covers the combined territories of Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Malta, Netherlands, Portugal, Slovenia and Sweden known as a "unitary patent". Any dispute as to the validity of a unitary patent or whether it has been infringed can be determined by a single tribunal at the Central Division of the Court of First Instance in Paris or Munich or its local or regional divisions in the above contracting states. Appeals from the judgments of that Court will lie to the Court of Appeal in Luxembourg.
The British government had signed the Agreement on a Unified Patent Court on 19 Feb 2013. Parliament had passed the Intellectual Property Act 2014 to enable the United Kingdom to ratify the Agreement. On World Intellectual Property Day 2018, the Rt Hon Boris Johnson MP, in his capacity as Foreign Secretary, had actually deposited HM Government's instrument of ratification two years after the brexit referendum (see British Ratification of the UPC Agreement - Possibly the best thing to happen on World Intellectual Property Day 26 April 2018 NIPC News). London was to host part of the Central Division of the Court of First Instance as well as one of possibly several local divisions for the United Kingdom.
The British government withdrew from the Agreement in 2020 (see Volte-Face on the Unified Patent Court Agreement 29 Feb 2020 NIPC News). In the 7 years before the UK's withdrawal British lawyers and officials had contributed much to the Unified Patent Court and unitary patent project. It is possible to detect British influence in similarities with the Civil Procedure Rules in some of the Rules of Procedure of the Unified Patent Court and in the templates or precedents for the orders of the Unified Patent Court.
Even though the UK is no longer participating in the project a single patent covering the territories of the three largest economies of the European Union will interest many British businesses. As the Court will interpret and apply the European Patent Convention to which this country remains a party, its judgments will be of strong persuasive authority. Perhaps for the same reason some of the decisions of our courts will be considered and in some cases followed by the Unified Patent Court. Because of its importance to business owners and lawyers in the UK, I will follow and discuss the Court's judgments and other developments relating to unitary patents.
Anyone wishing to discuss this topic may call me on +44 (0)20 7404 5252 during office hours or send me a message through my contact page,
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