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The European Commission has proposed new rules on technology licensing with changes to the Block Exemption Regulation. James Nurton examines why many companies fear the new rules will stifle innovation

The bankruptcy reform Organic Act 8/2003, published on July 9 this year, amended the Organic Act of the Judiciary and set up the commercial courts and the Community Trade Mark Court.

As from January 1 2004 essential changes will be introduced in the Polish structure of jurisdiction and two Acts will come into force - the Act on the Structure of Common Courts of Law and the Act on Administrative Procedure. Administrative jurisdiction will be a two-tiered one. Up to now the only court in control of administrative issues has been the Supreme Administrative Court. As from next year there will also be regional administrative courts. The necessity to introduce two-tiered administrative jurisdiction derives from the provisions of the new Constitution of the Republic of Poland adopted in 1997. These legal changes will exert substantial influence on issues related to industrial property protection in Poland, including trade marks. Along with these Acts entering into force, the Law on Industrial Property that applies, among others, to trade mark protection will also change.

In a judgment handed down in the case of Class International v SmithKline Beecham on 28 August 2003, the Court of Appeal at The Hague posed six preliminary questions for the ECJ. Our firm handles this case on behalf of GlaxoSmithKline.

There are two results of prosecuting trade mark applications in any part of the world: either you obtain a registration, or you do not. However, in Mexico there has not been a trade mark denial resulting from not overcoming citations or registrability objections for about 10 years.

Patent practitioners in Argentina, Brazil and Mexico are grappling with the boom in new technologies. Ingrid Hering investigates how attorneys, patent offices and courts are coping with the new challenges

The Registered Designs Bill was introduced in Parliament on June 30 2000 and subsequently passed on August 25 2000 as the Industrial Designs Act 2000 ("the new Act" ) . The Implementing Rules however have yet to be published.

The European Patent Office leads the world in the online services that it offers to its users. Véronique Rogier, epoline communications manager, explains how to make the most of the system

The full, unedited, interview with Marshall Phelps, covering his role at IBM, software patenting and many other topics.

Applicants not familiar with all the particularities of the European patent system are often surprised by the repeated requests of their European representatives to indicate support for the wording of every new or amended claim to be submitted to the European Patent Office (EPO). At the same time, strong feelings often overwhelm European patent attorneys when, during examination, they receive a pile of brand new claims from overseas colleagues with the cheerful remark that the claims have already been issued by their national patent office in a parallel application, together with instructions to file those claims at the EPO. This mutual "misunderstanding" has its roots in the provisions of the notorious Article 123 of the European Patent Convention (EPC), whose second paragraph requires that the subject matter is supported by the content of the original application, whereas the third paragraph prohibits the scope of protection of an issued patent being extended during opposition proceedings.