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A proposed merger between top-rated New York IP boutique Pennie & Edmonds and general firm Jones, Day, Reavis & Pogue has been scuppered after a partnership vote.

As patent applications soar, patent office leaders and lawmakers are considering new ways to make the process of obtaining protection more efficient. James Nurton reports from the WIPO Patent Conference in Geneva

During the past decades, the world has been observing the phenomenon of globalization. Large corporations have joined forces to multiply their profits or to avoid negative financial performance and new corporations have resulted from such joint ventures and mergers.

Lucian Enescu In Romania, the holder of a previously registered trade mark (or application), or of a notorious trade mark may, under law no 84/1998, file an opposition to the registration of a new trade mark (within three months from the date when it was published in the Official Gazette). The opponent may consider the new sign as being prejudicial to their previous right if it is identical or similar to their own trade mark or if it protects identical or similar products as the ones protected by their own trade mark. An assessment in the case of identical marks is simpler. For similar trade marks, three possible types of similarity must be considered when analyzing a new trade mark for registration: visual, phonetic and semantic.

Stephen Whybrow, CMS Cameron McKenna, London

One of the key issues in the complex of problems surrounding exhaustion is the question of whether goods bearing the mark of a trade mark owner have been put on the market with that owner's consent. If so, the trade mark owner cannot prohibit parallel-importers from importing the goods into the EEA, according to article 7, section 1 of the Harmonization Directive (89/104/EEC).

? China: An appeal court in Shanghai has banned seven former Unilever employees from appealing any further against a verdict finding them guilty of making fake shampoo worth Rmb1.27 million

There are grounds under the UK Trade Marks Act (1994, section 3(6)) for refusal or invalidity of registration where a trade mark is applied for in bad faith. The provision derives from the European Trade Marks Harmonization Directive (89/104) and has a counterpart in EU Trade Mark Regulation 40/94 (article 51(1)(b)). Bad faith is not defined and its scope has produced a divide between UK and EU case law over the need for subjective dishonesty on the part of the trade mark applicant (Trillium, First Cancellation Division of OHIM, C000053447/1, March 28 2000).

A rare glimpse into the workings of the USPTO reveals an organization rich in history and poised on the threshold of change. Sam Mamudi visits the Arlington agency and finds out what makes it tick

The difference between first-to-invent and first-to-file is critical to the US and Chinese patent systems. Now that China has joined the WTO, inventors must keep proper records of invention if they want US patents, argue Jack Barufka, Bryan Collins and Catherine Sun