EU patent court – now or never?

27 January 2012

While FICPI and other stakeholders have once again appealed to legislators to reconsider a variety of issues around the envisaged unified EU patent system, most observers have good reason to fear that the proposal, including a unified patent court, will be rushed through under the current Danish EU presidency.

The text of the regulation is expected to be finalised at a meeting of the Jurists/Linguists Group of the Council of the European Union on January 26. Provided that the seat of the central division of the Unified Patent Court can be agreed upon, the regulation will be subject to plenary vote by the European Parliament in mid-February. It is expected that the vast majority of political parties in the Parliament will vote in favour, after which the Council may proceed to adopt the proposals into European law. The political and legislative road thus seems paved towards adoption of the proposal within six months.

One point of criticism raised by FICPI and others is that the details of the rules of procedure of the court have not been made available and publicly debated. Further, the composition of the first instance panel of the court has been objected to because the panels of the local and regional divisions will comprise three legally qualified judges. Only the central division will include a technically qualified judge when dealing with infringement issues. FICPI has further expressed the opinion that the Court of Justice of the EU should be a final authority in patent matters.

Despite these concerns, it appears that legislators say "now or never", while FICPI and others call for a calm and thoughtful discussion at technical and political levels. Provided that the seat of the central division court can be agreed (which might have happened already at the date of publication), it would seem that the European legislators' desire to move forward will steam roll all objections.