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So far the German practice as to patentability of computer program-related inventions has been rather strict, in particular with regard to the requirement of a technical character which was denied for most program-related inventions unless there was an interaction between the programmed method or computer with an external technical means. By two recent decisions, however, the Federal Supreme Court considerably extended the area in which program-related inventions will be considered as patentable technical inventions.

The Finnish Patent Law was amended on 15 July 2000. The law specifies the principles of patentability, definition of the invention and the scope of the patent in accordance with the EU biotechnology directive. Principally the Finnish patent practice has been in accordance with the directive for some time.

The doctrine of contributory infringement was first introduced into Australian patent statute by the Patents Act 1990. Section 117 of the Act provides:

A recent Full Federal Court decision in Australia has held that the contributory infringement provisions found in the Patents Act 1990 are effective in relation to method claims.

WIPO has turned the tables on multinational companies with the publication of a draft report on protecting traditional knowledge. The 320-page report covers owners of tradition-based literary, artistic or scientific intellectual activity.

A string of high-profile cases has raised the question of where the boundaries of trade mark protection should be drawn. In the first article in a series, a team of correspondents compare trade mark registrability in eight countries from China to Chile

Politicians and regulators are responding to competition in the pharmaceutical industry by threatening patent rights. The consequence will be all out war between branded companies and generics. Tabitha Parker reports from the front line

John A Tessensohn and Shusaku Yamamoto explain the evolution of a trade mark dispute over the Starbucks logo, and examine the usefulness of Japan's Unfair Competition Prevention Law

The Andean Pact Decision 344, applicable in the five countries of the Andean Community (Ecuador, Peru, Bolivia, Colombia and Venezuela) provides in article 1 that the member countries shall grant patents to inventions of either products and/or processes in all fields of technology, provided that they are new, have inventive level, and have an industrial use.

The Spanish Government has drafted a new Trade Mark Law which will be presented to the Spanish Parliament for debate later this year. The new law will tighten the existing 1988 law by enforcing the Spanish Constitutional Court ruling which argued that competence in some matters of trade marks should correspond to the Spanish Autonomous Communities; some provisions of the Protocol and TRIPs Agreement; harmonization with the Community Trade Mark Regulation and the complete implementation of the Trade Mark Law Treaty including the introduction of the multi-class system.