Europe: The sky is not the limit

Managing IP is part of Legal Benchmarking Limited, 4 Bouverie Street, London, EC4Y 8AX

Copyright © Legal Benchmarking Limited and its affiliated companies 2025

Accessibility | Terms of Use | Privacy Policy | Modern Slavery Statement

Europe: The sky is not the limit

This summer, the Court of Justice of the EU issued a ruling that dealt with the application of article 14 of the EU IP Enforcement Directive. According to this article, EU member states must ensure that in court cases, the reasonable and proportionate legal costs and other expenses incurred by the successful party shall, as a general rule, be borne by the losing party. While one could gather from this that the sky's the limit as far as costs compensations in IP cases go, the Court ruling teaches us there may in fact be limits.

It all started with a court case in Belgium, in which claims were made to stop a patent infringement. The claims were denied and the plaintiff was ordered to bear the fixed costs (€11,000) of the defendant, based on provisions of national procedural law. In appeal, the amount of the fixed costs was under discussion, the original defendant claiming that the national provisions of fixed costs were not in conformity with Article 14 of the Directive, and that the plaintiff should pay all costs incurred, amounting to €225,862.55, which is obviously much higher than the fixed costs.

Accordingly, the Court had to rule whether national systems of fixed costs are in conflict with Article 14 of the Directive. Referring to the common goal of the Directive, the Court pointed out that IP infringers must be discouraged from infringing IP rights, justifying high cost awards. At the same time, Article 14 of the Directive merely states that the compensation covers the reasonable and proportionate costs, which does not imply all costs, but only "at least a significant and appropriate part of the reasonable costs". As long as these particular criteria are met, national law provisions are allowed to impose an absolute threshold above which no costs are compensated.

In national IP practices such as the Dutch, where full cost awards are nowadays the rule rather than the exception, this ruling may very well be regarded as the beginning of a new trend.

cleuver2.jpg

Jurriaan Cleuver


V.O.Johan de Wittlaan 72517 JR The HagueThe NetherlandsTel: +31 70 416 67 11Fax: +31 70 416 67 99info@vo.euwww.vo.eu

more from across site and SHARED ros bottom lb

More from across our site

Matthew Yeates, managing director at Integrated IP, discusses its acquisition of Clark IP and reveals further expansion plans
Paul Lee discusses moving from venture capital to IP, why lawyers are becoming more receptive to tech, and why he starts his day with a cold plunge
Barbara Lawton, a counsellor and mental health trainer at wellbeing charity Jonathan’s Voice, outlines tips for engaging with vulnerable people
New partner Amir Ghavi, who will help launch the group, says he expects more lateral hires in the coming weeks
Counsel at three firms reveal the tools they’re using to generate patent invalidity claim charts and why they’re making investments in the technology
Eric Lee says the firm’s thought leadership on artificial intelligence convinced him to move
McKool Smith and Arnold Ruess are among the firms acting for InterDigital
Law firms are developing AI tools to improve productivity and efficiency – and that is having an impact on patent and trademark work
Harpreet Dhaliwal is HGF’s first lateral partner hire since it received private equity investment at the end of last year
Munich-based Epic Legal, founded by Nicolás Schmitz and Philipp Strommer, hopes to attract market talent by abandoning old-hat systems
Gift this article