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A good portion of the practice of most IP law firms is in litigating against parties that infringe on US patents. But it is important to understand that infringement may occur in three different forms: direct infringement, inducement of infringement and contributory infringement.

Section 6 of the Thai Trade Mark Act stipulates that a mark must be distinctive in order to be registrable. Section 7 (2) specifies that the word or clause employed in a mark must not directly refer to the character or quality of the goods. When examining a mark's potential descriptiveness, registrars usually use standard print dictionaries as their main reference. With recent technological advances, however, registrars have also begun to use internet sources to determine the meaning of some trade marks. Of course, the reliability of these online dictionaries may be called into question.

The Supreme Court has set important precedents on business method patents in Korea by hearing two cases.

The Indonesian government's IP enforcement team, known locally as TimNas, has begun the process of consulting with stakeholders about its IP enforcement strategy for 2010.

The German Federal Court of Justice (FCJ) has repeatedly emphasised in a series of decisions (Seitenspiegel, 2005; Kettenradanordnung, 2007) that the interpretation of a patent claim is a question of law and thus may not be committed to the court expert, but is the original duty of the court.

Confidential information relating can take the form of any business formula, process, R&D capabilities, client-related or operational information that ought to be protected as a trade secret. Any breach in handling such confidential information violates the IP rights of the concerned party and has been pursued through the courts on many occasions. The Delhi High Court has deliberated on the misuse of confidential information relating to industrial drawings and the grant of permanent injunction to restrain those drawings in case of Action Construction Equipment v Gulati Industrial Fabric P Ltd IA no 10073/2006 IN CS(OS) no 1740/2006.

The Enlarged Board of Appeal (EBA) of the EPO has recently decided case G 1/07 dealing with the exclusion from patentability of surgical methods.

On December 28 2009 the Supreme People's Court of China issued the Interpretation on Several Issues as to the Application of Laws Concerning Patent Infringement Cases. The Interpretation came into effect on January 1 2010.

The Canadian Federal Court emphasised the importance of filing a patent application with the correct set of figures in Scannex Technologies, LLC v Attorney General of Canada (2009 FC 1068). After a US patent application was filed, a corresponding international patent application was filed under the Patent Cooperation Treaty (PCT) with a different and thus incorrect set of figures. This PCT application entered the national phase in Canada as a Canadian patent application. The applicant requested that the Commissioner of Patents substitute the incorrect figures in the Patent Application with correct figures pursuant to section 8 of the Patent Act, which affords the Commissioner the discretion to correct clerical errors. In support, the applicant filed an affidavit stating that incorrect figures were filed due to the unintentional error of a clerk of the applicant's agent in the US, and filed a certified copy of the US patent application containing the correct figures. Notwithstanding the applicant's efforts, the Commissioner refused to correct the figures. The applicant then applied to the Federal Court for judicial review.

In the Austrian legal system a concept or defence based on acquiescence or past tolerance of behaviour is unknown – only the statute of limitation exists. Acquiescence has been implanted into it as alien element only in the Trade Mark Law and in the Law Against Unfair Competition as far as it regulates commercially used signs when Austria in 1999 finally implemented fully Article 9 of the EU Trade Mark Harmonisation Directive. No wonder that Austrian trade mark owners and courts still struggle with this concept.