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The House of Lords, the UK's highest court, is to hear arguments in a controversial dispute over a stent patent

Emma Barraclough, London

Recent developments in two long-running cases in Australia have fuelled the debate about IP owners' ability to register and enforce colour trade marks in the country

A patent for methods of internet shopping with a one-stop shopping cart was sold for £2.25 million ($4.45 million) at an auction in London last month

The value of fake goods traded internationally could be as high as $200 billion according to a preliminary report published by the OECD on June 4

A recent case highlights the difference in approach between the English courts and the European Patent Office (EPO) to second medical use claims, and raises the question as to whether English practice is compatible with that in the EPO.

Section 44(e) of the US Trade Mark Act affords a foreign trade mark owner the luxury of relying on a registration granted by the applicant's country of origin as a basis for registration in the United States. The Section 44(e) filing allows the applicant to secure a trade mark registration without demonstrating use of the mark in the United States, as all that is needed is an assertion of a bona fide intention to use the mark in commerce.

Turkey has ratified the UPOV Convention (1991 Act), the international convention for the protection of new varieties of plants. It was accepted by Turkish parliament and published as Law number 5601 in the Official Gazette on March 17 2007.

The Kaohsiung District Court of Taiwan rendered a final decision in April 2007 in a dispute between the World Trade Centers Association, Inc (WTCA) and Kaohsiung World Trade Center Co Ltd (KWTC), a local company. In the case, KWTC's use of the term World Trade Center and its Chinese equivalent as part of its company name was held by the Court to be a deceptive or obviously unfair action that would affect trade order, and was therefore in violation of Article 24 of the Fair Trade Act. The Court said that, although the trade mark registration owned by WTCA in Taiwan is the Chinese equivalent for Taipei World Trade Center, the three words World Trade Center contained in the mark are sufficiently distinctive to be a source identifier. The Court further indicated that, while KWTC's use of World Trade Center as part of its company name does not constitute trade mark infringement, such use would mislead the public into thinking that KWTC is affiliated with WTCA and would therefore engender marketplace confusion. KWTC was accordingly ordered to stop using World Trade Center and its Chinese equivalent as part of its company name and to change its Chinese company name registered with the authorities.

The debate concerning the need to clarify the secrecy legislation surrounding joint research projects has been going on for several years in Sweden without resulting in any legal amendments to safeguard secrecy. However, at the same time as the Seventh EU Research Framework Programme is now in force, the debate has finally reached a definitive solution.