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On May 14 2013 the General Court dismissed the appeal against the decision of the Board of Appeal of OHIM rejecting a trade mark application for the word fluege.de, under Article 7(1)(b) and (c) CTMR. The application was for services for "advertising, business management, business administration, office functions, transport, packaging and storage of goods, travel arrangement, services for providing foods and drink, accommodation services" in classes 35, 39 and 43.

On May 7 1997, Caterpillar Inc, a US company, filed two trade mark applications for its marks Caterpillar and design and Cat and design covering goods in class 14, such as watches, clocks, cuff links and tie tacks. On December 11 and 12 2002, Manolo P Samson, a Filipino businessman, filed his opposition against Caterpillar's trade mark applications.

The US Patent and Trademark Office's Trademark Trial and Appeal Board (TTAB) provides, among other things, a forum for trade mark owners to oppose the issuance of a certificate of registration for a mark filed by a third party which it believes is confusingly similar to its registered mark. Although the TTAB can issue a decision as to whether two marks are confusingly similar such that one of them should not be entitled to registration, the issue of whether one mark infringes another is beyond the scope of a TTAB proceeding and is instead left to the courts.

The use of expert witnesses in patent cases, and the emphasis put on them, varies between jurisdictions and even judges. What reforms are needed?

In several cases, a trade mark cannot be registered, even if it has sufficient distinctiveness, because there is an identical or similar trade mark previously registered or applied for to distinguish the same goods or services. Even though the Trade Mark Law does not specifically use the terms "confusion or likelihood of confusion", its main purpose is to avoid this situation. Section 3 of the Law says that a trade mark identical or similar to one previously registered or applied for to distinguish the same goods or services cannot be registered.

Following on from the recent substantive changes to obviousness under our Patents Act, the Patents Office has now sought to introduce further changes to the Act, likely to affect Australian patent rights.

On May 15, a full bench (three judges) of the Delhi High Court delivered a decision on important questions of law in the Microlube case. Certain common and important legal issues arose in two different suits relating to design infringement and these issues were referred to the larger bench in view of prior conflicting decisions issued by the Delhi High Court.

Over the past few years trade mark protection in the Middle East has become more attractive to brand owners worldwide. And with increasing demand for more comprehensive trade mark protection, it has become more and more important to consider issues of local language and culture.

In 2012, the Mexican Institute of Industrial Property (IMPI) initiated the first border measures remedy against the importation of an active ingredient, due to the alleged administrative infringement of a patent. Although that was not the first border measures action imposed by IMPI based on patents, it was the first occasion that IMPI granted border measures based on a medical patent.

The Swiss Federal Administrative Court in a recently published decision refused to grant a request for a stay of opposition appeal proceedings, even though the validity of the opposition plaintiff's trade mark had been challenged in a civil court nullity action brought by the opposition defendant.