They have made their comments in response to a consultation on the latest draft of rules of procedure for the UPC, drawn up by a group of lawyers and judges. The consultation officially ended yesterday.
The preparatory committee of the UPC says it has received more than 70 submissions and will publish many of them on its website.
Some law firms and associations of IP owners have already made their submissions public.
IP Federation, a group of UK companies including BAE Systems, Dyson and GlaxoSmithKline, raised a series of concerns in its paper. It said that the Court should accelerate bifurcated revocation claims to mitigate the possibility of a so-called injunction gap and ensure that staffing levels enable it to prioritise bifurcated cases.
The group also argued against patent owners being charged a fee to opt out of the UPC system, saying that patentees had not “’signed up’ to the UPC and should be entitled to divorce themselves from it without cost”. If the UPC system does levy a fee, it should be a purely administrative fee, rather than one designed to discourage opting out, the group said.
The IP Federation also called for greater clarity in the rules for opting out SPCs, more information about the rights of patent attorneys to appear before the UPC; levels of court fees; the use of technical experts; the nationality of technical judges, and the use of languages in litigation.
The submission from Bird & Bird was drafted by partners Bruno Vandermeulen and Wouter Pors and it echoes some of the concerns of the IP Federation. In particular, it calls for improvements to the proposed rules for opting out (and later opting back in) to the UPC system and makes suggestions for the way in which the Court handles simultaneous actions.
Speaking to Managing IP’s European Patent Reform Forum in Munich last month EPO official Margot Fröhlinger outlined the challenges that member states must overcome before the UPC and Unitary Patent come into effect. But she said that IP owners’ hopes or fears that they would not come into force were misplaced.
Have you made a submission to the consultation on the draft rules of procedure for the UPC? If so please comment below.
