Local Insights

Cwengile Cwele, with oversight from Chyreene Truluck of Spoor & Fisher South Africa, explains how the new process works and the implications for practitioners and rights holders

Pravir Palayathan of INLEX explains Mauritius’ customs-led system for protecting trademarks, regulating authorised importers and exporters, and swiftly seizing counterfeit goods

Matthew Costard of Spoor & Fisher Jersey outlines the key developments and says the modernisation of the country’s intellectual property regime presents immediate opportunities for brand owners

A landmark case involving the remodelling of luxury brand bags at the owner’s request has established legal principles on the trademark implications of such services, explains Min Son of Hanol IP & Law

Ranjan Narula and Parth Bajaj of RNA, Technology and IP Attorneys analyse new obligations concerning synthetically generated information, accelerated takedown provisions, and safe harbour implications amid rising SGI-driven scams

Loc Xuan Le of T&G Law Firm LLC (TGVN), the local associate firm of Tilleke & Gibbins, outlines key amendments to Vietnam’s Law on Intellectual Property concerning AI use of protected IP objects

Maria Kilimiris of Patrinos & Kilimiris explains a recent decision regarding how genuine use is assessed for trademarks registered across broad categories of goods and their subcategories

Annika Lückemann and Jan van Dieck of Bird & Bird analyse the Unified Patent Court’s opening ruling concerning a supplementary protection certificate, highlighting procedural peculiarities, urgency considerations, and possible implications for pharmaceutical originator-generic disputes

Mutlu Yıldırım Köse and İrem Girenes Yücesoy of Gün and Partners analyse the different approaches to similarity assessments conducted by the court of first instance in the proceedings and the Regional Court of Appeal

María Aurora García of Berken IP examines how Argentine courts are using dynamic injunctions to tackle illegal sports streaming, particularly in the context of major events such as the football World Cup

Brazil is establishing itself as a hub for biological agricultural formulations. Eduardo Hallak, Rafaella Oliveira, and Gislaine Zulli of Licks Attorneys analyse a fast-developing market and a decade of related patent activity

Stephania Cardiel of Becerril, Coca & Becerril examines how recent reforms signal a regional move towards faster, more internationally aligned innovation systems

In In re TracFone Wireless, Inc., the Trademark Trial and Appeal Board (TTAB) issued yet another decision finding that a particular designation fails to function as a mark – the subject of over 21% of precedential rulings this year. These decisions highlight the importance of brand owners, marketing teams, advertising departments and legal counsel coordinating effectively.

In Universal Standard Inc. v Target Corp. (S.D.N.Y., No. 18 Civ. 6042), the US District Court for the Southern District of New York addressed the question of whether sharing attorney-client privileged communications with a public relations firm destroys that privilege. The court found that Universal Standard waived the privilege by including its public relations firm, BrandLink, in emails discussing strategy related to the lawsuit.

In In re Hikari Sales USA, Inc., the Trademark Trial and Appeal Board (TTAB) issued a second precedential decision involving genericness, this year, just two days after issuing its first one. In doing so, the TTAB sent a strong message to brand owners hoping to obtain exclusive rights in highly descriptive or otherwise common terms.

Jean-Paul Wagner and Tiago Leal of Ipsilon Luxembourg explore recent judicial advancements and global trends shaping the future of AI innovation, and how to turn informed intellectual property strategies into engines of commercial success

Raluca Vasilescu of Cabinet M Oproiu finds that AI assistants are not very helpful for building and enforcing patent strategies – and explains why

Raluca Vasilescu of Cabinet M Oproiu finds that producing reliable, full patent applications remains a step too far for AI assistants at present