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? Australia: The Intellectual Property Laws Amendment Act 2003 has been passed by the Senate and received the Royal Assent. It deals with issues such as extensions of time in the Patents, Trade Marks and Designs Acts.

Sam Mamudi, New York

Stéphanie Bodoni

In April 2003, the PRC Trade Mark Office issued the new Collective Mark and Certification Mark Registration and Administration Measures, effective June 1 2003, to replace the 1994 version. The major provisions include the following:

? US: GlaxoSmithKline (GSK) has sealed more than twice the number of licensing deals than any of its rivals in the pharmaceutical industry, according to a new report by consulting firm Wood McKenzie, which found that GSK secured 83 licenses from 1988 to 2002. The second most successful companies, Aventis and Johnson & Johnson, had 44 deals each.

Patent owners or other intellectual property right holders often find themselves in a difficult situation when they have to prove a case of infringement without having direct access to the object which is suspected to be infringing. This may, for example, be the case if only a few machines or apparatus have been manufactured, and if there is no possibility for the patent proprietor to analyze or inspect the machine without consent of the manufacturer or current owner. This is particularly troublesome for patent owners in Germany since there are no procedural rules by which a potential infringer could be forced to disclose relevant information with regard to the alleged infringement.

The US Senate has approved a bill amendment that will change key provisions of the country's drugs laws, in a bid to speed generic entry on to the market.

James Nurton, London

Rapid innovation and intense investment in the biotech industry has required patent protection to adjust accordingly. Antonina Pakharenko-Anderson explains how Ukraine is rising to the biotech challenge

Bruce Proctor has global responsibility for all IP matters at premium drinks company Diageo. He tells Ingrid Hering about the challenges of protecting a brand portfolio that includes Smirnoff, Baileys and Guinness