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Copyright protection in New Zealand is governed by the Copyright Act 1994. The New Zealand Government recently passed a number of controversial amendments to this Act in an effort to bring it up to speed with emerging advances in digital technology and to deal with the massive problem of copyright infringement on the internet.

On March 6, the Supreme Court of The Netherlands (Hoge Raad) issued two decisions in patent cases.

In a recent decision rendered following an infringement action brought on behalf of the Greek originator pharmaceutical company Uni-Pharma Kleon Tsetis Pharmaceutical Laboratories SA against a Greek generic company, the Full Bench Court of Athens held for the first time that obtaining a marketing authorisation (MA) for a generic pharmaceutical product that infringes patent rights does not legitimise the circulation of the generic product in the market.

The Federal Court of Australia, in Sunnyfield Association v Cronk [2009] FCA 33, recently provided further evidence that the fair basis requirement in Australia is being interpreted more liberally. Fair basis is analogous to the European requirement of sufficiency of description. A more liberal approach in this area is likely to benefit patentees, and that was certainly the case here, where the court upheld decisions of the Commissioner of Patents to reject oppositions filed against the grant of each of two accepted patent applications.

Parallel imports continue to boggle people's minds. The February case involving Porsche Cayenne (where Customs lost the case and the Porsche car was ordered by the court to be released) seems to have tipped the balance in favour of importers and more goods are released by some courts though others still issue judgments in favour of Customs and confiscate the goods. Still there are certain overtones to the issue.

Patent protection and enforcement can be a complex undertaking in Latin America. Corporate and private practice professionals, and a WIPO representative, discuss strategies

Under the Singapore Patents Act, an applicant can select from a number of options when requesting local substantive examination. These include requesting a combined search and examination report or requesting local examination based on a search report established for a corresponding application or international application.

The vital role of unfair competition law is widely recognised by most modern legal systems. Although there is no absolute definition of unfair competition, there is a general understanding of which types of conduct are considered incorrect or reprehensible.

On October 25 1995 a Polish entrepreneur Tomasz Bednarski conducting business under the company name Optyk Tomek in Warsaw applied for registration of a word trade mark Optometrysta ("optometrist") in class 42 for services such as "examination of eye refraction, selection of spectacles for individual needs, selection of contact lenses for individual needs, selection of telescopic spectacles for individual needs". On August 4 1998, the trade mark was registered by the Polish Patent Office under number R-104424.

Practitioners have welcomed a UK House of Lords decision to uphold Lundbeck's patent for escitalopram