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The Commercial Court of Lisbon, the main Portuguese court dealing with patent matters, has recently handed down a decision, backed up after appeal by the Appeal Court of Lisbon, that is a serious warning about the quality of translations filed for the validation of European patents as a literal interpretation of bad translated claims can affect the scope of the protection.

In Sweden, universities and other higher education institutions (HEIs) are classed as government agencies, and their main task as stipulated by law is to contribute to research and education. Like all Swedish government agencies, HEIs must abide by the Principle of Public Access to Official Documents. The conflict of interest between, on one hand, the need for increased commercialization of research results and therefore keeping certain results confidential to fulfil the novelty requirement in patent law and, on the other hand, the ambition to promote free research, and the publication of research results becomes obvious. How can this conflict be resolved?

Source codes of open source software are developed and distributed through licences known as the general public licence (GPL). However, the trade marks of the software developers are not distributed along with these source codes. While distributors' brands and trade marks belong to them, the underlying source code belongs to the open source community. Therefore, what is being sold or distributed here is just the source code and not the trade mark.

In a recent appeal case, Gopal Glass Works Ltd v AC of Patents & Designs Ors 2006 (33) PTC 434 (cal), Kolkata High Court examined the grounds for cancelling a registered design.

Software is invading every field of business, including telecommunications, industrial equipment, cars and audio-video media The development of new products results in the integration of computer programs that correspond to features, some of them widespread and others more original.

The Municipal Court in Prague stated in Decision 9Ca 68/2003-36 that use of a trade mark includes not only direct use of a mark through placing on products or packaging, but also indirect use in connection with those products or services, for example on accompanying documents or advertising. In this decision the Municipal Court refused an action against the decision of the President of the Industrial Property Office concerning the cancellation of a trade mark due to non-use.

Researchers at universities and polytechnics in Finland have previously had lots of freedom relating to inventions and IP rights. This means that all inventions made by researchers in universities belonged to the researcher himself. This is about to change. A new law, the Right to University Inventions Act, is coming into force on January 1 2007. This Act brings some radical changes into how IP rights matters are handled in Finnish universities.

The Croatian Academic and Research Network (CARNet), which administers top-level .hr domains, has introduced a new draft entitled Regulations Regarding the Organization of Top-Level "hr" Internet Domains and the Principles of Managing the Top-Level "hr" Domain. The new Draft will replace existing Regulations when it enters into force on January 1 2007.

On November 12 2006, the Supreme People's Court of China issued a notice requesting all high courts to submit, for record purposes, all the decisions made by them or lower courts within their respective jurisdictions, in which trade marks have been recognized as well-known. It also requested that in future when the these courts deem a mark to be well-known, the decision be filed with the Supreme People's Court.

In Merck & Co Inc v Arrow Pharmaceuticals Limited [2006] FCAFC 91, the Full Federal Court considered Merck's patent for a particular treatment regime using bisphosphonates, which were previously known as inhibitors of bone resorption. Merck had found a particular treatment regime that had a markedly reduced probability of deleterious side effects.