Strasbourg conference debates EU patent system

01 May 2010

As reported in Managing IP, the member states of the European Union agreed on the fundamentals of a future European and European Union Patent Court (EEUPC) in December of last year. The legislative process that will eventually lead to a statute on the creation of an EU patent and the EEUPC is followed with great interest and anxiousness by industry, attorneys, national judges and other specialists. In this respect, a number of Europe's most esteemed IP specialists were assembled in Strasbourg, France, on 16 and 17 April at a conference organised by the CEIPI Institute of Strasbourg University to analyse and debate the proposed setup for the EEUPC.

Many speakers and delegates expressed the hope that the future system will in fact make patent litigation in Europe less costly and put an end to diverging decisions and practice of national courts. However, the conference conveyed the clear message that users expect the EEUPC to live up to the high standards of the most experienced and competent courts of Germany, Great Britain and France, and that there exists a need for a setup for the recruitment and training of future judges of the EEUPC, which will safeguard a sufficiently high expertise of the court. The presence of technical judges at the court was generally welcomed.

The pending opinion of the European Court of Justice (ECJ) as to the compatibility of the draft statue with European Union law was addressed too. A ruling is expected before the end of 2010, and it was speculated whether the ECJ will require an amendment of the statute to safeguard supremacy of the ECJ over the EEUPC.

The possibility of the local and regional divisions of the EEUPC to refer counterclaims for invalidity to the court's central division, that is the possibility to separate first instance invalidity proceedings from infringement proceedings, was applauded by many. Other points of discussion related to the interplay between the European Patent Office and the EEUPC as well as to representation requirements.

In summary, the conference conveyed both enthusiasm and hope, on the one hand, and scepticism as to whether a unified EU patent system will in fact be established after more than 30 years of unsuccessful attempts, on the other hand. However, the system is indeed closer to reality than ever before.