Search results for

The US Supreme Court decision in MedImmune gave licensees the right to challenge a licensed patent while continuing to pay royalties. But those patent owners that are responding to the new challenge by redrafting their licences must pay close attention to EU competition rules, say Sangeeta Puran and David Fyfield

A monthly column devoted to IP curiosities and controversies, named in honour of John of Utynam – who received the world's first recorded patent in 1449

A new watchdog is being set up in France to regulate digital rights management systems and ensure that copyright owners and users follow the rules on copyright exceptions

The European Commission has finally published its blueprint for an EU-wide patent strategy

With the growth of the biotech industry and the maturing of the first breakthrough inventions, litigation over patents is becoming more frequent and spreading around the world. MIP has selected five important cases from the US, Australia, France and Germany that highlight some of the issues that have arisen in the past year. Emma Barraclough, James Nurton and Peter Ollier look at how the cases developed, and why they are significant for the industry

In my briefing last month, I explained that US patent litigation is governed by the American Rule pursuant to which the prevailing party is not automatically allowed to recover its attorney fees. Rule 54(d) of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure, however, states that "costs other than attorneys fees shall be allowed as of course to the prevailing party unless the court otherwise directs". The US Supreme Court has explained that Rule 54 does not provide "unrestrained discretion to tax costs to reimburse a winning litigant for every expense he has seen fit to incur in the conduct of his case" (Farmer v Arbian Am Oil Co, 379 US 227, 235 (1964)). Rather, federal courts are bound by 28 USC Section 1920, which expressly lists the kinds of expenses that a federal court may tax as costs, and the courts have stated that Section 1920 thereby imposes "rigid controls" on cost-shifting in federal courts ((Crawford Fitting Co v J T Gibbons, Inc, 482 US 437, 444 (1987)).

Malaysia's Multimedia Super Corridor has been a great success in attracting both international companies and high-tech start-ups. James Nurton asked Laura Ho of the Multimedia Development Corporation what is being done to promote IP awareness

The EU has been working with Malaysia to boost IP protection and to encourage countries in the region to share best practices. Niclas Morey, director of the EC-ASEAN Intellectual Property Rights Co-operation Programme, ECAP II, explains more

Is it possible to patent biotech and pharmaceutical inventions globally using just one specification? John T Callahan and Ken Sakurabayashi of Sughrue Mion PLLC examine practice in the US, Japan and Europe and suggest some considerations in drafting

Sharmila Sekarajasekaran of the Recording Industry Association of Malaysia explains how music companies have made use of landlord liability rules to make life far harder for music pirates